The FFAW says documents filed by Ottawa to defend reopening of a commercial cod fishery show all Liberal MPs supported the feds’ decision.

The reopening once again gives local processors and NAFO countries access to the resource with offshore draggers, while the stock remains in the cautious zone.

The union asked the courts in July to intervene and put the brakes on the decision in order to ensure the protection of the resource and future for inshore harvesters.

“What we’ve seen thus far is a Liberal caucus of NL politicians who supported breaking the 40-plus-year agreement to our province,” says FFAW-Unifor President Greg Pretty. “While it’s certainly not shocking at this point, it should be a real eye-opener to the people of our province who elected these individuals to office.”

The union says by lifting the 32-year moratorium on commercial fishing in June, the Government of Canada is “further corporatizing public resources, limiting the economic sustainability of coastal communities and breaking a decades-long promise to the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador.”

Pretty notes there was a promise for the first 115,000 metric tonnes of the 2J3KL northern cod quota to be allocated to inshore harvesters and Indigenous groups.

He calls the actions of the six Liberal MPs — Gudie Hutchings, Seamus O’Regan, Joanne Thompson, Churence Rogers, Yvonne Jones, and Ken McDonald — “a total betrayal.”

“The court documents show them in lockstep betrayal of harvesters, plant workers, and every fishing community in our province,” says Pretty.

“A cowardly show of contempt for workers will that be long remembered.”