More holes than a fisherman's net

From Gerard Baudains.

I WRITE with regard to the Draft Sea Fisheries (bag limits) (Jersey) Regulations 200- (Projet 58 of 2009).

This proposed law has more holes in it than a fisherman’s net. However, the reason I write is because the professional fishermen who, we are led to believe, fully support these regulations, appear, if their letters to the JEP are any measure of their thinking, not to understand what it is they so vigorously endorse. Have they in fact read the proposed law?

For example, one individual lauded the regulations as a conservation measure. They most certainly are not.

The report accompanying the proposition makes it clear conservation is not the purpose; rather it is an attempt to address the sale of fish by non-professional, unlicensed fishermen.

One only has to contemplate the scenario of a leisure fisherman setting a net – to find upon his return that he has been fortunate and has caught 45 bass. Under these regulations, he would have to throw away 40 dead fish. I struggle to understand how this could be considered conservation of fish stocks.

Another person representing professional fishermen suggested five bass, five lobsters and 20 ormers per day should be enough for anyone. Indeed it would, but in making that suggestion, the writer forgets that leisure fishermen do not fish six or seven days a week as the professionals do. He also overlooks other simple facts: fishing for ormers is restricted to just a few days per year – maybe none at all if the weather happens to be foul during the big spring tides; and trying to fish for bass and lobster on the same tide is hardly a viable proposition.

It happens I enjoy fishing for pollack – and sometimes catch the occasional bass in the process. However, the times when weather and tides combine to make such a trip a pleasurable day out are few and far between. The idea of five bass per day becomes (should I catch that many in one trip) not five bass per day, but five bass per month.

Suddenly, the scenario of 150 fish caught per month meets the reality of probably less than a dozen.

I said in my opening line that these regulations are full of holes. May I give a few examples? Contemplate that net with 45 fish in it. Do you throw 40 fish to the seagulls – or do you phone eight friends to meet you on the beach to ‘legalise’ your catch?

What if you’re fishing from a cabin cruiser and have a deep-freeze on board? Can you catch any number if you immediately freeze them?

The law is woefully inadequate in interpretations under Article 1 – for example there is no definition of ‘fresh’. What about safety? Many leisure fishermen like to fish with a buddy but, with limits of lobster being per boat, those two people could be encouraged to fish alone in two separate boats. What if a fisherman has a store box? If he lands, say, 40 lobsters in a day, cannot he claim that this represents at least eight days catch?

In conclusion, let us not lose sight of two things: the purpose of these regulations, which is to address the illegal sale of bass and lobster by leisure fishermen using boats (there must be a better way to achieve this) and the very worrying sentence near the top of page five of the Report, which reads ‘Initially, the regulations will only apply to bass, lobsters and ormers.’ Note the word ‘initially’.

Clearly this is designed to be the thin edge of a wedge to vigorously control one of the few leisure activities where people can ‘get away from it all’. A leisurely day out in a boat will instead become an irritation as one is harassed by fisheries inspectors boarding your boat to check your catch (remember, there is even a minimum size for prawns these days!)

This legislation must be thrown out and, if leisure fishermen selling their catch is such a problem (which I’m not persuaded it is) then more targeted legislation is the answer.

Glen-Moor,

Rue du Bourg,

St Clement.