Fight over rights, not fish numbers

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The conflict over West Coast fisheries is not over the number of fish Indians want to take, said the head of the Union of British Columbia Indian Chiefs.

The real issue is how much of their fishery Natives are willing to share with the non-Native, commercial fishermen, Saul Terry said.

"These guys are interlopers in these territories," he said. "What they're trying to do is maintain the status quo."

Non-Natives do not appreciate Native history, Terry said. The heritage of West Coast bands entitles them to control or harvest any resource.

But B.C. Fishermen's Survival Coalition spokesman Bob McKamey said Natives cannot control the resource that way.

"It's an unrealistic approach," he said. "I've run up against that rationalization before. All non-Natives in Canada would have to get out."

The coalition has clashed with both Native fishermen and Ottawa over the Aboriginal Fishing Strategy, a federal policy designed to guarantee Natives across Canada the right to fish for food, social and ceremonial purposes.

The coalition says the policy threatens to deplete stocks and give Natives an unfair advantage.

"We're not being unreasonable," McKamey said. "We're just asking to be listened to and to have the government look at the impact of this thing."

He based his concern on last fall's disappearance of almost 500,000 sockeye salmon in the Fraser River watershed. The shortage set off a volley of blame, with non-Native fishermen accusing the new Native fisheries of over-fishing.

An independent report concluded the shortage was no one group's fault.