For help, advice and discussion about stuff not related to aviation. Play nice: no religion, no politics and no axe grinding please.
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#1875372
Going back to "does anyone have a scoobie"....

My family has been involved in and around the fishing industry for many generations. We've owned fishing boats, built them, repaired them, fuelled them, bought and sold fish, and a few actually went to sea and fished. I am the last generation that will have anything to do with fish.

However, the whole vessel licencing and catch quota system has ended up both overly complex, restrictive and corrupt. That is both under the UK and the EU. I've tried, but still don't fully understand how it works. If somebody can justify why Manchester United Football Club can own UK fishing quota as an investment product, and then lease it to the highest bidder, do have a go. Much of UK quota is now in the hands of foreign operators.

But, back to the "B" event. UK fishermen are angry and feel sold down the river as the licencing and quotas didn't immediately all come back under UK control. The French are angry, because some of it did! (and more will, year on year). The EU states don't monitor landings caught, which is where the over fishing now stems from.

The trouble is, it is an emotional subject in fishing towns/familes, but on a national scale, it is a tiny part of the economy.

I could ramble on, but oddly enough, I have to go see a fisherman this morning. He needs a bigger boat, but if he buys a bigger boat he can't catch any fish because they won't let him transfer his quota!
#1875374
Pete L wrote: One way of looking at the EU is extended war reparations after the French gave up the Saarland when there was no coal and iron left (1959) - keeps the Germans just poor enough not to turn expansionist.


So why the F were we paying in, we didn't start it!
#1875388
UK fishermen sold their quotas, got compo for scrapping their boats and sat back in retirement. I thought quotas were a form of fishing stock conservation. Thousands of tons of perfectly good fish were ditched overboard when catches were exceeded. Those that held on to their quotas bought bigger boats, acquired high tech sounding equipment and the skill of fishing was taken out of it.
#1875391
What I know about sea fishing is limited to the tales I heard as a youngster from my late great uncle when on holiday with them. He was an "old style" Highland fisherman going out on his trawler for several days at a stretch. It was a hard life.

As I have watched the UK fishing industry shrink year on year over the last several decades, and the ecological problems caused by fishing quotas, it has been a classic example in my mind of the problems that arise when bureaucrats and politicians involve themselves in industries and activities of which they have not even a superficial knowledge. (I hope that observation isn't considered political).

PW
#1875395
This is really worth a listen. Conversation with actual fishermen and ex fishermen in Scotland including ones who had quotas and then didn't

#1875422
Bill McCarthy wrote:UK fishermen sold their quotas, got compo for scrapping their boats and sat back in retirement. I thought quotas were a form of fishing stock conservation. Thousands of tons of perfectly good fish were ditched overboard when catches were exceeded. Those that held on to their quotas bought bigger boats, acquired high tech sounding equipment and the skill of fishing was taken out of it.


1. quotas should never have been turned into a saleable commodity, it is permission to catch a portion of a nations resourced, leasehold not freehold. Somewhere that changed.
2. the compo was an enforced pittance, nobody got rich out of decommissioning other than the chap with the gas axe.
3. quotas would conserve if every EU state enforced them, but they don't.
4. the ditched fish is invariably the wrong species, not over quota. You can only catch what species you have quota for, bycatch is not supposed to be landed.
5. regardless of the improved technology, it is still a skill, if you are going to target species and not just catch everything.

To give an example of the insanity in fishing, I know a chap with quota for Sea Bass. The quota demands it is only caught by hook and line. If he is out fishing for a different species with nets and catches some Sea Bass, he has to discard it, dead. If he gets boarded (which he does) and has Sea Bass onboard whilst net fishing, he will get prosecuted even though he has quota for that fish. Only the UK enforce this, and they only enforce it on UK operated vessels.

It isn't just aviation we gold plate.
#1875423
eltonioni wrote:This is really worth a listen. Conversation with actual fishermen and ex fishermen in Scotland including ones who had quotas and then didn't



"Triangle toast eaters", I'm saving that one!
#1875427
I note in passing (and linguistic and historical interest but otherwise ignorance :oops: ) that the pertinent French 'Minister of the Sea' (which is only part of her portfolio):

- has a Breton forename
- was born in Normandy
- represented St Pierre et Miquelon (with its own historical fishing and other issues with Newfoundland and now Canada), to which she had family ties

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annick_Girardin

I suspect that she may have both greater interest, knowledge and empathy for the French fisherfolk's points of view than some of her Ministerial colleagues :wink: I'm not sure when there was a responsible UK Fisheries Minister with direct knowledge of the industry. The last MP whom I can recall talking knowledgeably about it was the late Austin Mitchell, MP for Grimsby, who never held Ministerial office; but I may thereby overlook others more recent :oops: .
#1875458
Victoria Prentis was the Minister of State at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs during the final stages of the "B" negotiations.

Too busy organising a nativity trail for her local school, to read her section of the final draft of the withdrawal agreement before it was accepted. Yet didn't get sacked.
#1875511
eltonioni wrote:@kanga Mr Gove


thanks, always happy to be better informed :thumright:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Gove

"..At the age of four months he was adopted by a Labour-supporting couple in Aberdeen, Ernest and Christine Gove, by whom he was brought up.[6] After he joined the Gove family, Logan's name was changed to Michael Andrew Gove.[3] His father, Ernest, ran a fish processing business .."

.. and then the pertinent SoS:

"Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (2017–2019)"

.. and while Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster:

"..After Boris Johnson said that the UK had ended trade talks with the EU in October 2020, Gove said that the door was "still ajar" if the EU made changes over issues including fishing access and that "We hope the EU will change their position and we are certainly not saying if they do change their position we can't talk to them".."
#1876443
What appears - to me at least - a strained “alliance” of EU countries are planning on “putting pressure” on the UK WRT trawling access.

I deliberately don’t say “fishing” - coz, well…long story.

It seems to me the French have press-ganged their “mates” into a diplomatic consolidated front - that looks like it’ll crumble at the first shove.
By johnm
FLYER Club Member  FLYER Club Member
#1876450
I still remember the cod wars with Iceland, fishing rights in the North Sea and surrounding areas have always been an issue. The CFP created an uneasy truce which is now being put at serious risk
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