Scottish RSA irrelevant - official line

[seaside]

Scotland has houses older than the United States, but the US can teach Scotland a lot when it comes to fisheries management. The Magnuson Stevenson Act is the basic document for fisheries in the US and shows a far better understanding of the importance of recreational fisheries/angling than the one you'll find -or not find- in Scotland and most European countries, and the EU institutions as well.

 

......... loads snipped

 

(5) The term "conservation and management" refers to all of the rules, regulations, conditions, methods, and other measures (A) which are required to rebuild, restore, or maintain, and which are useful in rebuilding, restoring, or maintaining, any fishery resource and the marine environment; and (B ) which are designed to assure that--

 

(i) a supply of food and other products may be taken, and that recreational benefits may be obtained, on a continuing basis;

 

(ii) irreversible or long-term adverse effects on fishery resources and the marine environment are avoided; and

 

(iii) there will be a multiplicity of options available with respect to future uses of these resources.

 

.....more snip....

 

Now only the biased and predujiced could argue with the above. Of course the devil is in the detail, but if the key objective was to ensure (i)-(iii) and not short term political games or monetary gain, then the marine environment and ALL its users would be better off.

[stavey]

Carful Seavey you'll blow a gasket.

 

 

In this area we have to live with the Euopean beamer fleet, which at the moment are working hard along the six mile , reports of seven large boats working in one small area a bit further south , and about the same amount working just north of us off Lowestoft ,and thee or four in between, been much the same for the last 30 odd years, they don't seem to have had much effect on our catches , after a slow start the fishing is now as good as ever.

 

Just had a thought, If the local FC was made up of just anglers, in fact if anglers were running the country and Nigel was primeminister , it would not make the slightest difference to the activities of the beamer fleet.

Hello Ian

 

Dont worry wurzel me old matey, i do have a few leaks in the old gasket but it has'nt blown completely off yet"

 

From your post's about these foreign beamers/trawlers etc would i be right in thinking you have no beef with them fishing in our inshore 6/12 mile limit? if you do and you would like to see them gone? then atleast we have something in common mate.

 

Each day that goe's by now i feel a tendency to lean a little more to the right with my political views, life on this island is becoming very hard to live with, this government's idea's favouring imigrants/ilegal black market workers and such ( of which i have just recently personaly experienced with the loss of two of my jobs and a third of my income) is a direct result of this, its not just this country's fishing industry that is being or has been undermined and sold down the swanny its all the working class's rights to earn a livable wage across the board whatever your job is.

 

So what can be done to stop this epidemic? well co-operation between the effected people or persons would be a start ie, uk's rsa's and commercial fishermen in this instance do you agree? i have read a lot of your posts on here and at times you have had some valid points but they never offer any real solutions only answers like" there is nothing wrong and leave us alone, if you came up with an creditable idea or proposal to put to the powers that be to oust all foreign fishing vessles out of our inshore 12 mile limit and stop the over fishing within it, then i am sure a lot of the rsa's in this country would give it backing ( i would) so over to you, or are you perfectly happy with things realy and you dont care how many foreigners come here in their beamers etc, taking what they want when they want and you having to stick to your rediculous quota's?

 

ps. if anyone thinks i have lost the plot then i suggest they open there eyes, it wont be long before i" and a lot of other manual working class people in this country will have no jobs to go to, as i have said before i have no political aspirations and seek no financial avantages, i am just a ordinary english manual working class bloke who is tired of being shyte on.........

[spanner]

... establishing our right to have a say in stock management of certain species like Skate, Tope Spurdog, Wrasse, Conger; none of which are targetted by Scottish commercial fishermen.

 

If they are not targetted is there any real need.

 

I still don't know what inshore activities the Scots get up to, that are damageing stocks so much.

 

Wurzel,

 

The problem is twofold.

 

Firstly, the inshore fleet barely targets fish throughout most of Scotland, but rather than that meaning there is no problem, it is the root of the problem. They don't target the fish because there are so few left and they are so small, and what little activity there is can be devasting when they target slow growing, low fecundity species like spurdogs. Targeting spawning stock and sites was a big mistake.....

 

Secondly, what they have shifted to now is shellfish, mostly cos its all that left rather than being a 'better' target. Unfortunatley a lot of that makes the situaion worse as scallop dredgers, razor hoovers & electro-fishers do massive damage to the environment and the whole eco-system.

 

Basically, much better management is required, of the whole eco-system. Leaving them to do it themselves will only perpetuate the problem until it goes away by itself...... down the pan.

[seaside]

So far, across all forums and from within the SFSA, there have been 27 emails / letters sent to MSPs and 5 responses have been noted. There has also been 3 supporting questions from outwith Scotland.

 

OK, not too bad so far, but could be better, for those that haven't had a go, don't forget you can find their email / snailmail details at

 

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/msp/

 

for those outwith Scotland, you may consider contacting Mr Finnie direct

Ross.Finnie.msp@scottish.parliament.uk

 

Please update this thread with any contact details

[Ian Burrett]

Just to let you know, a combined SACN/SFSA press release has just gone out to all the major newspapers. Let's hope some of them follow it up

[dale]

Ian,

just got my reply from south scot msp john scott.

he has written to finnie to ask questions re his dribble on RSA.

 

lets hope he gets the message some time soon.

 

i have my doubts though. he has the skin of a RHINO.

[Ian Burrett]

Ian,

just got my reply from south scot msp john scott.

he has written to finnie to ask questions re his dribble on RSA.

 

lets hope he gets the message some time soon.

 

i have my doubts though. he has the skin of a RHINO.

 

Thanks Dale

 

We have just got to keep plugging away and hope for a break sooner rather than later

[seaside]

Weve had a few more mails sent and responses back from MSPs' it would be great if we could get more, especially from thos of you 'down south'.

 

It appears now that Nicol Stephen, the Deputy First Minister and Leader of the Scots Lib Dem is tipping himself to replace Jack http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=720172006.

 

For those that haven't yet sent a mail, or even for those that have, perhaps you could include Nicol Stephen and let him know what an asset he's got in Mr Finnie, his email Nicol.Stephen.msp@scottish.parliament.uk

 

Please update this thread if you help out by sending a mail.

[spanner]

Got a reply from Mike Rumble, my MSP, and a copy of his request to Ross Finnie to answer our questions, mine and one other constituent that is.

[seaside]

Just to let you know, a combined SACN/SFSA press release has just gone out to all the major newspapers. Let's hope some of them follow it up

 

 

And it's in todays P & J ( NE Scotlands daily ) - didn't make the front page in banner headlines but it did get 9 column inches in the farming and fishing section.

 

Their response was " Inshore fisheries groups are being established to develop local management plans for commercial fisheries. We would expect their executive committees to consult all important stakeholders in the development of management plans. Formal stakeholder groups will be established to allow this to happen and, where appropriate, sea anglers will be invited to participate "

 

Load of WEASEL WORDS and from the postings re the antics of the ESFJC you can just guess where "appropriate and invited " will get us.

 

This gives another opportunity for those that haven't already mailed their MSP - now you've just seen it in the P & J and you are apalled at what you've just read, Mr Finnie should be ..........

 

Go on, you know it makes sense.