Don Staniford says he’s never had a fist fight — not even during his most ferocious action as a rugby player in high school or as a soccer player at university in the United Kingdom.
Change the subject to B.C.’s salmon farming industry, though, and the British-born activist with long, curly hair is more than willing to take on the world’s largest salmon-farming companies in the ring of public opinion.
His outspoken criticism has earned him an appearance at the Supreme Court of B.C. on Jan. 16 where he must defend himself against allegations from Mainstream Canada, the province’s second largest salmon farming company, that he defamed the organization.
The case could cost him CAD 125,000 if he loses.
The defamation case is the second Staniford has faced in the province since 2005 and the third major legal fight of his 18-year international campaigning career.
“It’s definitely a stressful situation,” said Staniford, who is a native of Merseyside, England, near Liverpool. “It’s obviously gearing up for a fight. It’s not a physical fight but it’s a mental fight.”
According to court documents, the case focuses on anti-salmon farming campaigns Staniford initiated on or about Jan. 31, 2011.
In those documents, Mainstream Canada's lawyer David Wotherspoon alleges Staniford disseminated and published defamatory and false statements about the company under three titles: “The Salmon Farming Kills Campaign,” the “Silent Spring of the Sea,” and “Smoke on the Water, Cancer on the Coast.”
