4 - Sunday, April 5, 1992 - North Shore News Strange blows the wind off Newfoundland IT’S HARD to teil some- times if things are really changing or whether they’re just getting more the same. Beb Hunter STRICTLY PERSONAL Over the choppy Auantic, a Canadian Armed Forces helicopter circles a small flotilla of protest boats. It must be preparing to ar- rest them, right? But somethirig’s wrong with the picture. Inside the chopper we find none other than John Crosbie, federal fisheries minister, waving supportively down at the protesters. Like, the Government of Canada is signalling its backing. Good grief, it’s on side with the protesters! Even more astonishing, the pro- testers on the boats below are waving back. What can be going on’ I can quite vividly remember being out on the ice floes off the coast of northern Newfoundland, watching as federal fisheries department and RCMP helicopters circled, preparing to come down to arrest us. WV diver WEST VANCOUVER diver Paige Gordon received the Elaine Tanner Award as the 1991 Canadian Female Junior Athlete of the Year from the Sport Federation of Canada during a cere- mony held Tuesday in Toronto. By Anna Marie D’Angelo News Reporter “To have my daughter there with all those (famous) people had to'be one of my life’s more ex- citing moments,”’’ said Paige’s fa- ther, Terry Gordon, on Friday. Paige, 18, was one of four Ca- A group of us had found our way a couple of hundred miles of- fshore where we had started inter- fering with the annual seal slaughter. This was causing Canada some embarrassment in other parts of the world by drawing attention to a dark little Canadian sideline: the mass killing of wildlife at the pup stage in international waters. To deal with our challenge, a handful of East Coast and Quebec politicians, including John Crosbie, quickly got together to push an order-in-council through the federal cabinet bringing a new law into effect: The Seal Protec- tion Regulations, according to which it was suddenly against the law to come near a Harp seal pup unless you had a licence (and the intent) to kill it. Not one of the great moments of Canadian juris- prudence. The issue became muddled beyond belief when movie starlet, including the living embodi- ment of Gallic female sexuality, Bridgette Bardot, arrived at the scene, followed by ‘‘Hot Lips”’ from M.A.S.H, Lost as it may have been in the subsequent media storm, a princi- pie of resource management had been the central debating point in the struggle over the future of the Harp seals. (Or ac least so far as my friends and ! were concerned.) Our position had been that the so-called ‘*hunt’’ was not being scientifically controiled any more so than was the whale hunt or most fisheries, for that matter. The models upon which fish, seal and whale population estimates were based were of du- bious value, to say the least, and in any event were always being ignored by politicians who ultimately set the quotas. This would be fine if we were just talking ward politics, but while the quotas may have satisfied constituents demanding immediate jobs on fishing boats and in packing plants (and in order to receive U!), the enormous greedy-guts harvests thus allowed inevitably drove policy further and further out of phase with the real- ity of the natural eco-system of the Atiantic and its ability to tegenerate itself oui of less and less biomass. More seals mean less fish, the fishermen and sealers alike hollered. More seals mean more fish, we replied, because in the end, the seal’s carcasses feed back into the foud chain, becoming a part of the algae upon which the small fish feed, providing food for the larger fish, and ultimately the fishermen. Alas, the fishermen’s catch is removed entirely from the nutrient cycle, and the ocean suffers a net biological decline. Interestingly enough, the protest ships that were just out in the Aulantic, being waved at by the stern-faced Mr. Crosbie, are espousing exactly the same princi- ple we were back then. Indeed, this is 1992, not 1976, And everyone is entitled to profit from experience. J never mind if someone picks up an old idea of mine. Why complain now that the East Coast fishermen have finally figured out you can't overharvest the eco-system at both ends without having it go into decline? It’s too bad the federal fisheries department waited until a couple of years ago to finally order some stiff reductions in cod quotas, but by then an enormous amount of the damage had been done, not Jeast of all to Canada's reputa- tion, Had we been consistent good Boy Scouts of conservation, our receives nat’l honors Paige Gordon nadian athletes selected for the prestigious Sport Federation honor. Eric Lindros picked up the mal: junior athlete award. Kurt Brown- ing was named Canada’s male senicr athlete, and world champi- on rower Silken Laumann was named Canada’s female senior athlete, Paige is the first Canadian diver to be a finalist for the Elaine Tanner Award. Besides dominating the Cana- dian diving scene since 1991, Paige has racked up a string of impressive international perfor- mances, including a silver medal at the 1991 Pan American Games. Gordon is considered the top Canadian diver going into Olym- pic qualifying competitions. to provide mlik, bread, fruits and vegetabies, etc. «FEED THE HUNGRY iN OUR COMMUNITY © $20 helps us buy a weekly bag of groceries for one family * $60 helps sustain a family for one month ¢ $720 assists that same family for a year Please help those in need. All donations are tax deductible. SUP AND MAIL WITH YOUR_GIET TODAY | t YES! | want to provide food for the hungry. a” . z AS {hi ) . Name —_— N g Address x City, Es Postal Province __. iS 14 THE FOOD BANK = 1650 Quehec Street, _ Vancouver, RC. V6A 3L6 C:$20 [3 $60 $720 O Other $____J] = 1 if Coe x eso.s6ed | Rie: voice would carry some clout in Europe. As it is, we are known as being just another pack of pirates. And now, in order to ‘“*preserve’’ or ‘‘save’’ the Grand Banks, we want to seize control of it. At the same time, led by the same John Crosbie, there is much mulling-about at the Ottawa level of reviving the seal hunt on the pretext of sending the meat to hungry former Soviets. This is (oh dear, here we go again) to prevent the seals from eating the caplin that the cod would otherwise eat... Strange how Crosbie and the b’yes have caught up with the idea of restraining themselves when it comes to pillaging the cod, but they’re still resisting the need for restraint when it comes to seais. They see the fish-eat-fish part of the equation, but stubbornly resist accepting the fish-eat- seals-too factor. I notice that the Newfoundland protest fleet left a dory moored to a buoy on the Grand Banks as a symbol of Canada’s claim to the great northern cod. They won media praise for the “almost Gandhian”’ beauty of the gesture. Maybe they'd forgotten that Iceland only won its own Cod War after its navy went out and butted up against British fishboats.. Never mind wimpy symbolic gestures, Canada’s navy should be out there, kicking ass. What Crosbie and the New- foundianders should have done was hire Pau! Watson to save the cod for them. He’d have put together a helluva lot more dy-".. namic a high seas demo than they MORE HUMAN BEINGS IN BC. ARE ABORTED EACH YEAR THAN THOSE WHO DIE OF EITHER HEART DISEASE OR CANCER. ~ For information on biomedical and ethical issues like abortion and euthanasia call the Resource Centre at Uf dedicated to results.. ¢ personal injury @ divorce e wrongful dismissal « general litigation ¢ conveyancing e wills and estates BALDWIN (OMPANY Law Office lf Lynn Valley Centre 985-8000 2. off Re-Roofing New 12 year guarantee TORCH-ON-MEMBRANE 7° TAR & GRAVEL. _ _ Cren canapaarhoorens conttétons aasoe non FULLY INSURED — FREE ESTIMATES | 986-1812 | RCABC FAX LINE: 984-2420 ee OnASNG COMTAACTIRS CtATiON OF B.C. 4 367B Lynn Ave., North Vancouver V7J 204