Joint Letter to Fisheries Min. Thompson re: Salmon Allocation Policy Review

March 27, 2026

The Hon. Joanne Thompson, PC, MP
Minister of Fisheries
Mail Stop 15N100, Floor 15, 200 Kent Street
Ottawa, ON, K1A 0E6
Via Email

Dear Minister Thompson,
We write you today regarding the Salmon Allocation Policy (SAP) review led by your ministry and
the discussion paper titled “Perspectives and Recommendations from the Review of the 1999 Allocation
Policy for Pacific Salmon in British Columbia” published by your ministry.
As you know, the SAP review was initiated in response to the 2018 British Columbia Supreme Court’s
ruling in Ahousaht, and Conservatives support an updated SAP that appropriately accommodates the
Ahousaht Decision’s provisions for court defined and treaty based commercial Indigenous fisheries.
However, your discussion paper shows your government is recklessly entertaining other changes to
the SAP, including removal of the well-established principle that fisheries in Canada are a shared
common resource.
Minister, when you appeared at the Standing Committee on Fisheries and Oceans on October 9, 2025,
you were asked “who owns Canada’s fisheries resources?” to which you correctly responded, “the
people of Canada.” It appears that you are now considering deviating from this principle.
As you deliberate on updates for the SAP, we must remind you that your authority for governing
fisheries exists because Members of Parliament, elected to represent the people of Canada, bestowed
that authority on the Minister of Fisheries. The people of Canada and us, their representatives elected
to Parliament, insist that you deliver an updated SAP that firmly upholds the essential principle of
fisheries resources being a shared common good.
In the SAP discussion paper, your ministry also published another proposal that would remove from
the public fishery its priority access over that of the commercial fishery for Chinook and Coho salmon
even though the commercial fishery already holds priority access to 95% of other salmon species. This
proposal poses certain devastation for the public fishery sector that generates $1.275 billion in annual
revenues, $643 Million in GDP, and provides 9,100 jobs in small businesses, coastal communities
including First Nations communities, marinas, lodges, guiding, and other retail and service businesses
along in British Columbia.
At a time when the national unemployment rate is 6.7% and 20,000 jobs were lost in British Columbia
alone in February 2026, it is unconscionable that your government would recklessly threaten thousands
of additional jobs in British Columbia’s coastal communities and beyond.
Minister, your updated Salmon Allocation Policy must conserve the principle of fisheries resources
being a shared common good and must also conserve the public fishery’s existing priority access for
Chinook and Coho salmon above that of the commercial fishery. We look forward to your response.
Sincerely,