Province Weighing Response To Metis Fishing Ruling

Province Weighing Response To Metis Fishing Ruling

Monday, July 18, 2005 at 13:43

A Saskatchewan Environment official says it will be the end of the week before the government decides its response to last week’s court ruling concerning Metis fishing rights.

Dave Harvey says that includes the decision of whether the province should appeal, and how Saskatchewan Environment will enforce the ruling in the interim.

On Friday, a judge decided Meadow Lake resident Ron Laviolette did, in fact, have the Metis right to fish out of season in Green Lake.

Judge Earl Kalenith agreed with Metis lawyers that Laviolette is part of a larger Metis community that has historically lived in northwest Saskatchewan and northeast Alberta, and as such, could fish anywhere he wanted in that region.

Harvey says he wasn’t surprised by the judge’s ruling, given what the Supreme Court said in its 2003 Powley decision.

Harvey says the province might choose not to appeal, but it will depend on whether the department can live with this particular judge’s interpretation of the Powley ruling.