A national sea licence. would it be unfair?

[JeffB]

Manofkent:

We have done this one to death, but it lives on! I cannot see any mileage in a licence whatsoever. It will not, absolutely will not, make any difference to fish stocks. Make no mistake. Only banning trawling and illegal trawling practices might have an effect in the long term. I emphasise long term. If it's not too late. Some species are in a desperate state, with stocks below recovery level.

Tell me how a license will affect that! Anyone who thinks that paying to fish will make everything all right is in some sort of fairy land. The tiny amount raised, would be swallowed up with admin costs.

You are the optimist and I'm sorry but very unrealistic in your views... Whereas you obviously speak the truth in respect of sea fish numbers being desparately low, your opinion that it's "all too late and a licence will do nothing" is a little off the mark. I mean what do you base these rash statements upon???

 

I, being a coarse and game fisherman also, have whitnessed at first hand the regeneration of many of our inland waters in the past 15 years. I am not just talking about expensive club lakes but the many miles of river and canal in the area.

 

Polution issues have been tackled and fish stocks have been replenished with restocking and breeding area programmes being put in place.

 

Basically, due to the continued hard work of the EA, the coarse fisherman now have access to some of the best fishing that's been had in the last 40 odd years.

 

Other than this, the coarse fisherman, due to the financial backing raised by the 4 million rod licences bought each year, also has a voice that cannot be ignored.

 

A lot of people seem to think that the rod licence would be just another money spinner designed to fill the governments coffers, but I would hazard a guess that not a lot of this revenue is seem by them.

 

All I know is that I am VERY SATISFIED with what I see coming back to me as a coarse angler and with this in mind I am very confident that the Sea angler would also get a good deal. By the fishermen, for the fishermen...

 

I am a firm believer that the money raised from the estimated 10 million sea anglers would be a lot more than the 'tiny amount' that you suggest would be raised. This money COULD start to make some of the changes that we desire...

 

Jeff

 

[ 28. June 2005, 10:02 AM: Message edited by: JeffB ]

[Ken Davison South Wales]

Hi Stavey,

 

We do give credit to landscape gardeners, some times several thousand pounds.

 

Why? Well when they pay us on completion of their projects we stand to gain a decent return.

 

It is the same with the licence, and individuly we stand to lose far less if it goes pear shape.

 

At the same time we stand to gain a lot if it goes well.

 

Take your area which appears to be suffering, if you collected £25 per head from your club members you would have £2500 to campaign with.

 

A national situation would raise say £25,000,000, if only £5,000,000 per year went to give us a bigger shout on a yearly basis, look at the power that would produce.

 

It would be directed at areas like yours giving your area a much better chance of doing something constructive.

 

Whilst I don't look it I am from the flower power period and I always take a positive view of things.

 

When I bought our garden centre it was brambles from front to back and a lot of poeple took a very negative view.

 

Today Debs and I have proved them wrong, it took five years of planning, hard work, scrimping and going without to achieve what we have now and during that period we took a very positive view at all times, even when we were eating bake beans on toast as a main meal several times per week.

 

I am a firm believer in looking for the positives and not giving out negative vibes.

[Ken Davison South Wales]

It looks like my sample figure of £25,000,000 was a bit low so give it times five £125,000,000

and that is only on 5,000,000 licences.

[JeffB]

Ken,

 

As you have rightly highlighted, the money raised could and would be injected in the very depressed areas that Stavey is talking about.

 

It is these areas that would be regenerated with artificial reefs being put in. These reefs would soon be populated and fish stocks will at least be getting a fair chance...

[Leon Roskilly]

er, just a couple of points re your figures Jeff.

 

Although it is generally acknowledged that there are around 3.5 million freshwater anglers, licence sales are well below this number (probably because those under 12 don't need a licence, and there are a significant minority of people who try to get away by fishing without a licence - sorry I can't readily find the actual number of sales)

 

The Drew Report estimates that there are 1.45 sea anglers in England and Wales that went fishing at least once in 2004 (not 10 million!).

 

With direct expenditure of £538 million we are already paying over £90 million in VAT.

 

(The Bradley Report has some estimates on what they expect to get in in the way of licence revenue, but I think there is much wrong with their estimates)

 

Have a look at Angling 2015.

 

Now if only someone was paying as much regard to Sea Anglers .........!

 

TL - leon

 

[ 28. June 2005, 11:03 AM: Message edited by: Leon Roskilly ]

[Ken Davison South Wales]

Hi Leon,

 

Now if only someone was paying as much regard to Sea Anglers .........!

 

I am sure that there will be once the licence is in place.

[stavey]

jeff said,I am a firm believer that the money raised from the estimated 10 million sea anglers would be a lot more than the 'tiny amount' that you suggest would be raised. This money COULD start to make some of the changes that we desire...

 

hi jeff, where did you get those figures from? 10 million is stretching it a bit, i million maybe about right?

 

guernsey bass and manofkent made some good points with their responses to this post, firstly manofkent has every right to be sceptical about bringing in a licence and then hoping things will get better i can see where he is coming from and i agree.

 

secondly guernsey bass raises the issue that although he greets the idea of a licence he knows that, in itself that is not going to get much for us sea anglers and he urges people to carry on lobbying, writing letters and keeping the pressure on the government etc, this i have and will continue to do so in my own way, and im sure most if not all on this forum will do the same.

 

what comes out of defra's office (i think its today?) will show how much they realy value sea angling? and if there is no talk about real restrictions on gillnets,trawling,pair and beam,protection of sport fish for anglers only,etc, and its only talk about a licence and its fee then it will show that nothing has changed, and they dont value sea angling at all, because if they did they would not need a few pennys from a few thousand anglers for such a valuable commodity. if it is realy worth over a billion or so pounds, it is money from the treasury we have already given them that they should be spending to protect and promote such a viable business.

[stavey]

leon,ken,jeff,and co. i know if the government want to push through a licence they will, it dont realy matter about such peoples opinions like mine and members of my club when it comes down to it. it will however come down to ones own personal principles whether you comply and buy one or not, and this is what representatives should more concerned about if they are going to base a lot of their arguements on it....

[Steve Walker]

JeffB:

 

I, being a coarse and game fisherman also, have whitnessed at first hand the regeneration of many of our inland waters in the past 15 years. I am not just talking about expensive club lakes but the many miles of river and canal in the area.

 

Polution issues have been tackled and fish stocks have been replenished with restocking and breeding area programmes being put in place.

Jeff, what you say is undoubtedly true. In particular, water quality in rivers has improved dramatically. From my own experience, the Tame, Goyt and Etherow tributaries of the Mersey now all hold worthwhile stocks, and even the Mersey itself. The story for the lower Thames is similar, and I understand the Trent is a lot cleaner than it used to be.

 

We should be careful, however, of attributing all of this improvement to licensing. In my opinion, the single greatest contribution to the improvement of water quality was the separation of the enforcement (gamekeeper) and sewage treatment (poacher)roles previously both held by the water authorities. It has been the independent scrutiny by the NRA and subsequently the EA, and to a lesser degree the pressure applied by Ofwat which has forced the privatised water companies to clean up their act.

 

It's true that the money to fund restocking programmes has come largely from license fees, but the core requirement of clean water is a duty of the EA independent of its fisheries role. Restocking enormously speeds the recovery of a fishery, and is always welcome. I remember fishing the upper Tame for roach one summer and being amazed to catch a small chub every chuck. A chat with the local fisheries officer confirmed that they'd put them in. As long as there are breeding populations still living somewhere in a river system, though, with time and clean water it will recover anyway.

 

The point is that clean rivers are not just for anglers. They benefit people who want to canoe or birdwatch or explore the wildlife under the pebbles or just sit by the bank with their toes in the water. The regulation of discharges into rivers had to happen whether anglers cared or not.

 

We have an analogous situation with beach water quality, and that seems to be improving. I don't think we have an analogous situation with commercial overfishing because the public by and large don't give a toss. So, where the freshwater anglers got the improvements they wanted, because they were improvements everyone wanted, I'm not sure that sea anglers will be so lucky.

 

The key, I think, is to find out who *does* care, and gang up with them. Bird people seem concerned about industrial fishing of small species. Lots of people care about sea mammals. Is there an umbrella organisation to bring these parties together?

 

[ 28. June 2005, 11:38 AM: Message edited by: Steve Walker ]

[stavey]

good post steve.