Thursday, May 8, 2014

Gutting the Big Blue Whale

Two dead big Blue Whales are being gutted on our shores by good scientists from Ontario.

The good people of this province ought to pay very close attention to how it's done.

Very soon we have a big bad political Blue Whale that will need to be gutted and rendered to nothing in the next federal election.  The bloated carcass washed upon our shores in 2006 and it has left a terrible rotting stink in our province ever since.

Nowhere does the smell reek more fiercely than in our fishery sector.

The federal Blue Whale has swam around for years doing its best to avoid doing anything for our industry -i.e. neglect.  When it did enter the bay where our near-broken fishery lay- it wrecked more severe and lasting damage.

From chronic mismanagement (including degrading our science and research capabilities and failing to properly rebuild our precious resource);  to failing to implement custodial management, as promised; to failing to give us an equal say(at least) in our fishery through joint management, as promised; to the downgrading of our Search and Rescue services; to the unbelievable and contemptible way it has treated our province and our people with its arrogance, the bloated Blue Whale has simply become unbearable.

The very foul stench around the recent Shrimp quota cuts is enough to bring one to one's knees. This decision underscores the need for the big bombastic Blue Whale to be towed out to sea and never be seen again.

The Dictator of Fisheries rendered a decision that went against the majority of people in the industry and province when she applied a dubious and destructive principle to further threaten the inshore shrimp industry.   How does one person/one minister get vested with such power?

The stench heightened as our All-Party Shrimp Committee travelled to Ottawa  since the big blue Minister wouldn't come our way. Our commendable All-Party representatives then had to present to not ONE but TWO Fisheries Committees - all in the hopes these parliamentary committees would try and relay to the Minister that her decision stank to high heaven and she should reconsider.


Why wasn't this ego-bloated political mammal there to hear these important and passionate pleas from East coast Canadians about their important industry? Because she doesn't care.

The whole matter leaves one feeling  disrespected, insulted  and affronted. This is deeply disturbing treatment by the big Blue Whale and his pod mates.  It is unacceptable.

These feelings were echoed by inshore fisherman Brad Watkins on the Fisheries Broadcast this evening. He shared his appall and anger over how he was badly mistreated by the big bad Blue Whale when he tried to share his expert narrative with the House of Commons Fisheries Committee.  

And now the word is the big bad Blue Whale's Minister has already said a big fat NO to reversing the reeking shrimp decision - without even first hearing from the Committees. Let them eat no shrimp.


We should not and we must not allow this god-forsaken smell to continue any longer.  

The big Blue Whale is rotting our lives, our culture, our economy, our values and most of all our pride and our dignity. By accepting the mistreatment, we are condoning political bullying and reducing ourselves to helpless victims, individually and collectively.

The solution is to remove the decayed and offending carcass out of sight and out of our lives.

When Ottawa sends us the good scientist in 2015 called the Election, let's get ready to gut the big bad stinky Blue Whale. 

Until then, we got to be creative in coming up with ways to mask the stench.  Brad Watkins is taking the legal route as one way to skin the unwanted beast. He deserves our support.


We deserve not to be listed as an endangered culture. 

-30-