Hastings Fishermen convicted by a 'Red Herring'

[Ken Davison South Wales]

Paul,

 

You have put a lot of effort into your report and by now you will have seen some answers posted.

 

May I ask if you have read the link anglersnet.co.uk/ubb/ultimatebb...ic;f=2;t=003925 posted above ?

 

And may I also ask how and why you decided to post?

[maximo]

im with you stavey and anyone who is earning less than £100 a week should really think about a career change.

[Leon Roskilly]

Ken your link doesn't work (you needed to leave a space before the full stop)

 

Try this

 

anglersnet.co.uk/ubb/ultimatebb...ic;f=2;t=003925

 

Tight Lines - leon

[Ken Davison South Wales]

Sorry Leon,

 

I was just trying to establish if Paul had read the link that you posted.

 

I think his posting seemed a bit of a windup, seemed a bit strange to come to this site looking for support.

 

I would also like to establish where he fits into this situation, he is not a commercial fisherman and he does not appear to be an angler.

[Paul M]

Seems like I've create a bit of a furore on this Forum!

 

In case you wondered, I exposed this story on the Forum simply because a lot of commercial fishermen use this website. Believe me it's NO wind-up!!

 

Firstly, I live in Hastings and am an avid shore beachcaster – have been for over 50 years! I also occasionally go out boat fishing with rod & line.

 

Secondly, when I saw the news reports about the Hastings fishermen's conviction, and read and saw various other news reports on the TV, as an avid consumerite and Editor of Rip-Off Britain the past six years, I immediately recognised there'd been a travesty of justice.

 

What you must realise that the Hastings beach boats are NOT like your large beamers or factory ships. In the scheme of things they catch very little fish - certainly as compared with the French, who have TEN TIMES the UK quota.

 

There are some 18 small boats of less than 10 metres in the Hastings 'fleet' that are beach launched, but 'actively' only about half a dozen ever get to sea at any one time these days. They never go past the 6-mile mark, and their area is only 10 miles to east or west. The average 'net' income of these guys less than £100 a week!

 

In October 2003 there were a record number of cod in the English Channel - in fact, there were so many I understand they were almost jumping into the boat. It’s been proven that the English Channel cod are endemic to the area where they both breed and feed. They do NOT even seem to be related to the North Sea cod - Channel cod even look slightly different!!

 

Regardless of what anyone says, fish in our area are NOT in short supply. On the contrary, there are large numbers of cod, plaice and sole. Small commercial boat fishermen in our area of Sussex are acutely aware of preserving stocks, but boats under 10 metres are NOT subjected to the same rules as larger craft. They do not have to keep logs, or report the number of fish they catch. Because of the size & number or their nets (they even use larger mesh than recommended!), that are NOT dragged along the sea bed, but are static, and the amount of fish they can catch at any one time is limited - as they are by tide and weather.

 

The problem is that DEFRA knows about the '10 metre' rule, and relied upon the Sea Fish Act 1967 regarding 'licences' in convicting our two Hastings fishermen. The Judge even concocted a ‘new’ law that never existed before!!

 

Paul Joy, one of the convicted, is well known and has been Chairman of the Hastings Fisherman’s Protection Society for the past 20 years. He is extremely vocal about EU & UK fishing legislation and the way its administered - that has almost decimated the Hastings ‘fleet’. Simply put, DEFRA have done a hatchet job on him. The fine the Court imposed on him personally is worth more than his 50 year-old boat RX83!!

 

The Court case was a fiasco, and an Appeal has been launched.

 

Before anyone of this Forum makes further comment, I suggest they closely read my article at www.rip-off.co.uk/fishing

 

Regards,

 

Paul Meyer

Editor – Rip-Off Britain

[sanctuary]

Paul your talking to us as if we don't know whats happening to our fish stocks and that the only people who do are the commercial fishermen you quote them "Regardless of what anyone says, fish in our area are NOT in short supply. On the contrary, there are large numbers of cod, plaice and sole."

WE know that this is not true, fish are in short supply and they are small fish we know this because we fish these waters, so please don't make that mistake by only looking at one side of this argument look to the facts re fish stocks.

[Newt]

I've read the article and it is interesting.

 

Several comments about what you wrote of the case and the fishermen involved:

 

quote:

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Because of the Judges' ruling Joy and his colleague were (rightly or wrongly), advised by their counsel to plead guilty. ... More disturbing is that both fishermen were denied the right to give evidence in their own defence!

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Plead guilty and of course you can't give evidence in your own defense. You said you did it.

 

Still, I was with you up thru that point. But when you are doing one of these documentary/exposee pieces you need to make sure you are writing verifiable 'facts'.

quote:

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Paul Joy has been Chairman of The Hastings Fisherman's Protection Society for the past 20 years, so it is inconceivable he would blatantly or knowingly break the law - in 33 years of fishing, Paul has never infringed any fishing regulation and, up until his conviction, has had a clean slate. The same applies to Graeme Bossom who has fished the last 25 years.

---

The bolded sentences are pretty obviously things you can't know first hand unless you've made every fishing trip with this pair so you must have had someone tell you about their never having done any infringing of a single fishing regulation and repeated it in your article as if it were fact rather than heresay or speculation. One has to wonder how much of the rest of the article is like this.

 

One last personal peeve of mine - please avoid writing 'decimated' when you mean destroyed if, in fact, that is what you meant. Decimated means 'reduced by 10%".

 

[ 31. January 2005, 04:07 PM: Message edited by: Newt ]

[Huge_Vitae]

Paul,

 

I think you will find that those who post here are not meerly ranting and raving, we did (certaily I did) bother to read your article in the full and note it's contents.

 

You have I am afraid, lessend your own case in the view of many here by taking the simple line that Fish Stocks are strong and that there is no problem with the methods used by these people.

 

We strongly and wholeheartedly disagree and that is the responce to the questions posed.

 

I am sure that you believe in what you write but that does not mean you, (or I) are correct.

 

We believe we have a case and as such we make opinion based on it.

 

Your article is very emotive, even down to the rusty kettle but the fact remains that discarding dead undersized fish to the delight of your accompanying herrings is exactly what we find wrong in netting.

 

As for "wrongly advised" to plead guilty....

 

Who is the fool in that situation

[Guest jay_con]

All that aside there is a huge injustice here. A skipper from yorkshire, either last year or the year before was fined 250 for fishing in a prohibited area. This skipper was a very rich boat owner/business man.

 

A man who can afford to pay a bigger fine got away lightly whilst these 2 small timers got absolutely hammered.

[Marshian]

quote:

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In October 2003 there were a record number of cod in the English Channel - in fact, there were so many I understand they were almost jumping into the boat.

---

If they were there in October 2003, which I don't remember, they sure as hell are not there now, maybe someone netted them! On our last boat trip, back in November, 8 anglers fishing for 6 hours, NO cod.