Stories like this just flat-out puzzle me. Given that my father served for years as a wildlife conservation enforcement officer (a number of those years unarmed, I believe,) I can certainly see how this situation is far too volatile for the officers to get involved in. A group of people + high powered hunting rifles = scary situation. I get that.

What I don't understand is how it's allowable. You have people charging government helicopters, threatening to take it down by interfering with the rotor blades, endangering the safety of the officers. I don't care how "volatile" the situation is, there's no justification for that behaviour, especially when the Quebec Innu are poaching a protected herd of caribou. Reducing the herd by 40% is not sustainable by any measure. If the conservation officers are endangered by the actions of the hunters, it's time to call in the RCMP, not wait around to press charges.

Again, perhaps I'm biased here because of family connections, but it's not like the officers are preventing the Innu from hunting at all- they're protecting an endangered herd of less than 100. Minister Dunderdale is doing one thing intelligently- the conservation officers are almost certainly under-manned and under-equipped to deal with the threat- but now is the time to call in the big boys. We wouldn't tolerate it if the Hells Angels charged at an RCMP chopper; why do we allow our conservation enforcement officers to have their lives similarly threatened?