The government wants to regulate every aspect of every drop of water from Sooke to Nanaimo. Well, maybe there are a few too many objectors there, let’s just do Saltspring to Saanich.
A proposal to regulate every aspect of marine and human life (recreational and commercial) on or over or adjacent to the “emerald sea” was pitched at committee of the whole Monday night. Parks Canada proposes restricting hundreds of square kilometres of Sidney’s costal waters to a Marine Conservation Area Reserve, to protect mysterious unidentified endangered species and habitat existing nowhere else in the thousands and thousands of miles of B.C. coastline.
According to the spokesman for Parks Canada, anyone using the new zone would do so, only after proving to Ottawa that their activity is environmentally sustainable. This additional bureaucracy should streamline any issues you have with replacing the posts under your dock, or renegotiating the more than 1,500 tenured interests within the zone. We don’t have an issue with posts and tenured interests, but we are about to create one and create an agency to solve it.
One big selling point is gas and oil exploration will be banned from the zone, potentially protecting us from disaster. When asked after their presentation, “what if we discover the largest gas and oil deposit in all Canada” right in the middle?” the formerly warm and friendly presenter turned on his heels and spat out, “Oh, we already know there is no oil or gas out there.”
The only species to benefit from this new government boondoggle will be the “red herring”.
Ray Headrick
Sidney