Update on Angling Trust

[barry luxton]

Personally I would be far happier to be represented by a numerically strong and financially well resourced body to fight for my future rights.

 

Rather than simply being left alone to take my chances as the future is shaped around me by others.

 

Before i could consider joining, i would like to see someone within this new trust, or the trust itself come out with all guns blazing and show some intent saying no we ain't going to accept that we will only except..........instead of fighting a rear guard action to prevent the demise of the rsa experiance. The marine bill, defra portrayed it as something that all including the rsa could look forward to. Why is it that the feeling is one of forboding. What is being shown even now by the trust is much the same by the previous org's, sorry lads we can only do............

 

Is it me not reading it right.

 

Regarding funding, why can't the trust go to the government and tell them, based on what the rsa put into the public coffers we require funding back from you along the lines of the commercial sector. If they have to replace a trawl net with one that is more technically advanced for example, the answer is yes we can do that for you. Why not the rsa then.

[Steve Coppolo]

I hope that I've misinterpreted this as I can't believe what I'm reading. I'd have thought that bass nursery areas would be good for bass and good for bass anglers. Or is it a case of "not in my back yard"?

 

No, you haven't misinterpreted my comments, Steve. What you've, apparently, misinterpreted is the good that bass nursery areas actually do - for bass and sea anglers. Yes, they give a certain amount of protection, from boat anglers and netters, to juvenile bass - whilst they are inside the nursery area. Given the numbers of juvenile bass in areas that aren't designated BNA's, against the numbers of juvenile bass in areas that are, I have serious doubts about how effective they really are. My local bass nursery area is the baffle, in the River Blackwater, Bradwell. It is an area of around a quarter of a square mile that used to be the warm water outfall from Bradwell Power Station. That power station has been shut down for a number of years now, yet the whole area is teaming with juvenile bass. The whole of the River Blackwater is heavily netted by professional and hobby netters, yet the river is still alive with small bass in the summer. How much of an effect is that redundant quarter of a square mile BNA, having?

 

There are other estuaries in Essex and Suffolk that have never had the 'benefit' of being labelled bass nursery areas, that hold even more juvenile bass than the Blackwater. Why should that be? If BNA's are having such an effect on bass stocks, the Blackwater should hold more small bass than anywhere else in the area, but this isn't the case. The problem is, that the bass, small and big, don't stay in the nursery areas. They don't stay in any estuary for 12 months of the year. They may return to the same areas each summer, but they also move off to other places at different times of the year, where, of course, they get hammered. In fact, a local commercial netter takes huge amounts of bass, that probably spend a lot of their time in the River Blackwater and other local estuaries, off of the Maplin Sands - every year. With the way bass move and the way they are targetted commercially, unless you make the whole ocean a bass nursery area, you can't really protect them.

 

Then, of course, once the bass reach maturity, they travel even further afield. Moving offshore to over winter in huge shoals where they are targetted by the pair trawlers, then congregating on the inshore sandbanks in the spring to spawn, where they are caught by netters and rod and liners.

 

Making estuaries into BNA's and restricting anglers might make some people feel as if they are doing something positive, it might even make them sleep a little better at night, but I don't think that the overall effectiveness of BNA's is all it's cracked up to be. In fact, I'd go as far as to say that I don't think they make any diffrence to bass stocks at all, in the long term. The best they do is provide some, not much, temporary santuary for a small percentage of fish, that live in one small area. The latest idea that I've seen proposed is that bass nursery areas become fish nursery areas, which would mean that, if it ever becomes the law, not only won't you be allowed to fish for bass from a boat in the area, but you won't be able to fish for fish! As I said, restrictions on anglers for no real benefit.

 

Another thing your post has highlighted, Steve, is - if the outcome of the bass nursery area review depended on what stance the Angling Trust took, it could decided by people who might base their vote on what is 'accepted' as being right, without looking deeper into the real implications. Not putting you into that category, but I'm sure you see what I mean.

[glennk]

Not just the Marine Bill Barry, dont forget the RSA strategy too. Non of the angling bodies even tried to fight a rear guard action on that condescending piece of nonsense infact numerous anglers had a hand in drafting that. A few have since tried to clear their names but it shouldn't be forgot these people were part of the demise of sea angling.

[Steve Burke]

Another thing your post has highlighted, Steve, is - if the outcome of the bass nursery area review depended on what stance the Angling Trust took, it could decided by people who might base their vote on what is 'accepted' as being right, without looking deeper into the real implications. Not putting you into that category, but I'm sure you see what I mean.

 

Thanks for your explanation, Steve. I'm not qualified to judge if it's correct as I do very little sea angling today as it's nowhere good as it was in my youth, despite the good winter for codling in Kent.

 

Turning to your quote above, I'd have thought you'd have a lot more chance of influencing the members of the Angling Trust from within. How else can you reach sufficient members, all of whom have a vote whilst you don't? After all, very few of them will be reading this Forum or any other for that matter.

[Elton]

Turning to your quote above, I'd have thought you'd have a lot more chance of influencing the members of the Angling Trust from within. How else can you reach sufficient members, all of whom have a vote whilst you don't? After all, very few of them will be reading this Forum or any other for that matter.

 

Steve,

 

I keep hearing that comment. It's exactly the same as advising people to join the BNP if they disagree with their policies, or any other group for that matter. I'd have thought you could apply a lot more pressure to any organisation from outside it, especially if the implication is that you are supporting it when joining?

[Steve Burke]

Steve,

 

I keep hearing that comment. It's exactly the same as advising people to join the BNP if they disagree with their policies, or any other group for that matter. I'd have thought you could apply a lot more pressure to any organisation from outside it, especially if the implication is that you are supporting it when joining?

 

Sorry Elton, but that's a spurious argument. The same would apply to the Monster Raving Loony Party or The Flat Earth Society for that matter.

 

Remember that the Government has already stated that it wants to listen to just one angling voice. We therefore need a consensus, and I believe the best (and for that matter only) way is via the Angling Trust. The AT is recognised by the Govenment as this voice regardless of whether some individuals think it should be.

 

Steve, if you feel that strongly why not both join the Angling Trust and stand for election?

[Elton]

.

 

Remember that the Government has already stated that it wants to listen to just one angling voice.

 

So, society has to do what the Government wants now? They are there to serve us, not the other way around.

 

Every citizen of this country has an equal right to have their say on matters that affect their lives. Joining any organisation has no bearing on this right and, most definitely, not joining any organisation should not remove that right.

 

I can't speak for the other Steve, but I dare say he's too busy fighting real fires to find time to fight metaphorical ones.

[Steve Burke]

So, society has to do what the Government wants now? Sorry, I thought it was the other way around.

 

May be so. But that's the way it is.

 

The reason given is that it was too time consuming and an inefficient waste of resources speaking to loads of fractured angling bodies all saying different things.

[Elton]

May be so. But that's the way it is.

 

The reason given is that it was too time consuming and an inefficient waste of resources speaking to loads of fractured angling bodies all saying different things.

 

If the Angling Trust's role is to make the Government's life easy, I'll ask for my cheque back. They shouldn't give a stuff what the Government want, think, or demand. They should represent anglers and anglers only, whatever or whomever that appeases or upsets. They should never be in the back pocket of any political party. I fully expect that of them.

[Bob Bradford]

I am going to e-mail Mark Lloyd the CEO of Angling Trust and ask him to read this thread, I think it is imperative Angling Trust gains the trust of Sea anglers, clearly there are huge issues and history tainting the thought process of so many sea anglers, it is not for me to try to gain your trust or answer your doubts, Angling Trust need to kick into gear and I will tell the man at the top exactly that, I am a member of AT, so I have every right to make this demand......and that is the most significant point , invest just £20 for membership and then demand value for money, or in other words NO PAY,NO SAY the choice really is that simple,

 

Bob.