Tuesday, 22 March 2011

Fish & Fly were delighted to be represented by Richard Hewitt and Jeff Woodhouse at The Angling Summit held at Westminster yesterday (21st March 2011) and where delegates from many influential parts of the industry had wide ranging discussions regarding the future management and development of angling.

It is easy to say “here we go again” but during the presentations and in the workshops, where we all had the opportunity to participate, there would appear to be a new approach and a real desire to listen, to be more transparent and to work in partnership with angling and fishery communities.

The Summit was ‘chaired’ by Gavin Ross (Deputy Director, Sustainable Fisheries DEFRA) and there were presentations by Richard Benyon MP (Minister for the Natural Environment and Fisheries as part of the Conservative-Liberal Coalition Government.), David Moore (Angling Development Board),Adam Brown (Substance Angling Research), Andy Schofield (Fishing Wales Project Environment Agency), Mark Lloyd (Angling Trust), Geoff Bateman, Head of Fisheries and Biodiversity, Environment Agency), Arlin Rickard (Association of Rivers Trusts). In addition there was a talk by Charles Walker MP (Chairman of the All Party Angling Group).

We were impressed by the ‘mood’ of the Summit in that consultation, partnership and transparency were at the core of the discussions.
Richard Benyon MP made it clear that after full consultation he was prepared to be bold to instigate changes necessary to remove obstacles to realise the full potential of Angling and for example to increase fish stocks, protect endangered species and to increase awareness of the benefits of angling socially, economically and to the environment.

The point was made that angling is very diversified with the main broad divisions being sea, coarse and game and each division needed a different approach. With regard to Game Fishing at Fish & Fly and the Salmon Atlas and Coarse Fishing at Fishing Magic we host very large and active communities and those members interested in these issues do have an opportunity to make their views made and we guarantee these thoughts will be collated by Fish & Fly and presented to Richard Benyon MP for his consideration.

In view of the public nature of our sites your comments will also undoubtedly be read directly by many of the influential participants in the decision making process.

To help a debate on the issues we would like to pose three questions that were put to the workshops at the Summit.

1. What are the obstacles to the realisation of the social, economic and environmental benefits of angling and how do we overcome them?

2. What can the angling community do at a local level to generate more benefits and/or to raise awareness to local key players of the value of angling?

3. What are the obstacles to the Government and the angling/fisheries communities working closer together and how do we overcome these and build trust.

Please post your constructive thoughts below and we would politely ask that you keep to the topic of the thread.

Many thanks


Admin

well done Admin.Great to see some positive moves between interested bodies and the government.more power to you elbows.This is long overdue.

Jim

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The Fishermans Friend is the Flirty Fly,Fickle Food for Fleeting Fish.

Thanks for your support of this Jim.

I genuinely believe our community can make a difference!

Some great knowledge on here!

Richard

Nice to see them playing catch-up with the Scottish Government, Jim

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publicati.../06/26110733/0

Not that there has been very much come from it over the intervening three years

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Don't worry, be happy.
Sandy
Carried it in full, then carry it out empty.

I reiterate the point that anyone interested in this subject would appear to have a chance to influence things or at least be heard.

It would be good to see a debate developing on this.

The Environment Agency are willing to engage in this thread if there are sensible questions to be answered/debated.

Richard

1. What are the obstacles to the realisation of the social, economic and environmental benefits of angling and how do we overcome them?

A large obstacle has to be the cost of fishing in many places with game fishing typically being the most expensive. In the south east where a trout day ticket probably starts at around £20 in a few places and climbs rapidly upwards to starting at £50 or more how can we expect new or even current anglers to continue to be able to afford their sport. There will always be a demand for exclusivity and I am all for that - I like splashing out on a big fish water now and then too, but there is a need for very affordable entry level fisheries in order to get more newcomers and particularly youngsters into the sport. Is this economically viable? Should it be government subsidised?

The other thing I used to rely on as a kid was the list of free fisheries in the back of the annual EA fishing rules and regs publication. These seem to have all but dissappeared sadly but there must be the opportunity to bring some of these back to public attention somehow or persuade landowners to open them up once more. This of course may be at odds with the environmental benefits of angling unless of course it can be built in to a program of regeneration as we are seeing in many cities now with local watercourses being cleaned and returned to a more natural state after decades of abuse.
At the moment these schemes seem to rely on a dedicated band of local volunteers to register the problem and then decide to act and do something about it. Is there scope for a more nationally led scheme to identify watercourses that could benefit from regeneration and then act as the initiator in trying to start a local cleanup effort? Does the growing Association of River Trusts have a chance to lead this effort?

Just my initial thoughts on the first question but would be interested to hear others opinions on this?

I am Liaison Officer for West Yorks Salmon & Trout Association branch. We have been concerned for some time that the present ruling on stocking, namely only triploid stock to be introduced, is but a warning shot from Europe in a move to ban stocking totally in the long term. This being so, we have decided to go the route of trying to provide a resource in our area for habitat improvement schemes, to attempt to improve our local rivers both in river and on the riparian zones by using proven techniques, to fulfill their potential in producing better quality natural stock. There are, as many of you out there will undoubtedly know, many techniques which can be used to achieve this; we at W Yorks S&TA are trying to compile a library of such so that we can perhaps with co-operation from the EA and River Trusts, incorporate these techniques into Club and other riparian owners' efforts to improve their waters. The Irish have had immense success with restoring ruined rivers and streams, using local material and soft engineering practices, in making rivers ruined by drainage schemes viable fisheries (or at least fish producing resources) again; and there is a wealth of experience available from our cvousins across the pond. It will be essential to bring onside all interested parties; we have only just started this project, and already have had discussions with the Yorkshire Dales River Trust to find a tributary stream on which we might try out some of the ideas and monitor the results, whilst at the same time making a contribution to the general amenity and environment scene in the countryside in incorporating tree planting etc which will benefit all wildlife as well as just fish. We are still as I have said sounding out local opinion, but if there is sufficient interest we woulkd anticipate that the local EA representatives will then be contacted, and we hope there would be full co-operation there in light of their parlous financial state as regards carrying out beneficial projects off their own bat.

In principle, I don't think so. There is plenty of cheap fishing available, just not much cheap game fishing. My local coarse fishing club memberships each cost me the price of one to three days fishing for stocked trout. A couple of them even include a bit of wild trout fishing, though I suppose that's unusual.

To paraphrase Marie Antoinette, "let them catch roach"!

To my mind, a better solution to improving access to game fishing than subsidising expensive stocked fisheries would be to spend any money which is available on improving wild trout and grayling fishing on public or cheap day ticket river fisheries. If public money is to be spent, I would rather it went to Trout In The Town style projects than to purchasing stockies. To me, that feels like funding municipal sports facilities versus subsidising health spa membership.

Take it easy stoney303, it isn't that important.

The way the OP is worded it comes across as if it is a National Angling Summit, which it isn't, it is an English/Welsh one.

I have no interest in what happens in England/Wales as in sixty years I have never fished there. The only reason I put up that link was as a help but they saw it as a dig Most of the questions they were asking have already been addressed in that document. Albeit pertaining to Scotland but it would still have been worthwhile for them to read through it to gauge the answers they might expect.

I am not a Scottish Nationalist but it really galls me when something is put up that appears to encompass the whole of the UK but turns out only to concern England/Wales, that isn't national it is parochial and should state so to stop confusion.

__________________
Don't worry, be happy.
Sandy
Carried it in full, then carry it out empty.

Just as a passing matter of interest, when I was with the S&TA Scotland about 6 -7 years ago, a survey was carried out by I think Strathclyde University toi establish the value of angling to the Scottish economy, and it turned out fishing earned more for the country than golf! It would be interesting to collate the annual angling spend in England, just to see what it contributes down here