Wes Tender

So those licences are time limited. Those arrangements above were formed under the CFP regime. Presumably now we are free from the CFP, we are at liberty to alter those rules applicable to foreign owned vessels because we have regained control our own coastal waters and its resources. Hopefully in the ongoing discussions with the EU over fisheries, we will only agree to an initial period of readjustment of a maximum 3 years where the EU catch declines marginally if we have to, and then an annual review thereafter. Their talk of ten years agreements tied in to trade talk reviews is idiotic.

I have my doubts about what you say about the Marine Management Organisation and the conditions attached to the permits they issue. You say that they are not time limited, but I would be very surprised if there were not caveats applied to their timescale. The MMO has powers to revoke permits under certain circumstances, so maybe under the current situation whereby the MMO was set up effectively to pay lip service to the CFP, now that we will be free of it, I expect that legally our obligations regarding the permits will also alter, and also our ability to alter those terms to our advantage in specifying crew composition, catch landing port, etc. I wonder whether under those circumstances there will be any legal redress on grounds of breach of contract, as possibly the newly passed Fisheries Act covers the legal aspects of the new reality. Compensation is a different matter, which will need to be assessed by independent arbitration. Independent means not the ECJ, of course.

As our resident fisheries expert doesn't deign to respond, I might as well get the ball rolling again in light of the developments within the last few hours. For some sort of idea of how things might go in a situation whereby the EU have far more limited access to our coastal waters than they believe they ought to be entitled to, one can look back to how it was historically for us during the Cod Wars with Iceland when we felt that we were the wronged party. There were several skirmishes, ramming of boats, involvement of the RN pitted against their coastguard, cutting of nets, etc. If the French, Spanish, Dutch, Germans decide to continue fishing without our permission, then that will be an illegal act and we will be entitled to take appropriate action against them. I expect that it could get quite nasty, especially against the bolshie French. As for them trying to stop us exporting our fish into their markets, then that will be cutting off their nose to spite their face, as presumably they import our fish because they have a liking and need for it. If they don't want it from us, then where else will they get it from? Initially also, a blockade of ports will work against them exporting their produce to us too, and much more of it is coming in this direction than going in theirs, so it wouldn't be long before they came to their senses. If the Scots manage to rejoin the EU as an independent nation, then apart from the difficulties that will provide with a border between them and their main market, us, they will have to accept their waters becoming an EU resource under the CFP, apart from the currency and freedom of movement issues. As to the recent developments, a couple of days ago, Barnier stated that he wouldn't bother to come for talks today unless we were prepared to move on our red lines. We called his bluff and now he looks stupid for coming anyway. It appears that as an excuse, the EU have offered to compromise their stance on fisheries away from expecting to maintain their status quo access under the CFP, to one whereby in a fit of extreme generosity, they will be prepared to return to us between 15 and 18% of the quotas held by EU fishermen in our own territorial waters. Apparently government sources here have told them already that that is a derisory offer and to go and get lost. In return the EU has said that this offer was one that was made some weeks ago, not the last day or so. The other idea the EU stupidly believes that we might accept, is that any fisheries deal should last for 10 years, should be tied together to the trade agreement, and both revisited at the end of that time. Again, it is completely ludicrous and the EU are just wasting their time and ours. Barnier should be reminded of his threat not to come unless we budged on our red lines, told that we are not budging and inch, and asked why he bothered to come if the EU aren't prepared to treat us as a sovereign independent nation able to have complete control of our own affairs, laws and territorial waters.

Why don't you engage with all of the issues instead of boring with only one side of it? As a typical dyed in the wool remoaner, you persist in this argument like a stuck record that fisheries is a tiny part of the economy, whilst refusing to acknowledge or argue the main reason why we don't roll over and surrender control of our coastal waters; the political dimension. Do you even recognise that although fisheries is a small part of both the economies of the UK and the EU coastal states, the political implications of the negotiations over fisheries for all of them are immense, and go beyond the votes in those coastal constituencies? As I already said, the fact that both we and the EU are prepared to accept the breakdown of a FTA deal just on this issue ought to give you a clue to the importance of this politically. As for your comments on industrialised fishing v small boats, and the price of fresh fish v frozen, nobody patronises on here quite as well as you do. Regarding the preferences for the types of fish that we like to eat, you seem to believe that people's tastes don't change at all. 25 years ago Thai food was largely unknown in the UK and is now in the top three cuisines. Most cities have restaurants serving cuisines from many countries, like Mexico, Japan, Vietnam, Nepal, Eastern Europe, etc. People don't just holiday in the UK anymore; they travel to destinations all around the continent and the world, sampling the local cuisine. Television programming schedules are overloaded with cookery programmes featuring all varieties of fish and crustaceans. But there you go, we only like to eat what we have always eaten historically, so we're never going to develop a taste for other varieties of seafood, are we?

We hold by far the stronger hand, as the percentage of our catch in EU waters is minuscule compared to their catch in our waters. https://marinedevelopments.blog.gov.uk/2018/09/27/mmo-fisheries-statistics-2017-eez/

Well done for dismissing the concerns of such a large proportion of the electorate; the usual remoaner arrogance. I accept that the current situation on fisheries has been caused by successive UK governments, much in the same way that the current situation of our membership of the Federal United States of Europe evolved. It started with the betrayal of the industry by Grocer Heath when we joined the Common Market, and then via the CFP, in parallel with the morphing of the Common Market/EEC into the EU via the machinations of the successive governments, whether Conservative or Labour, without the electorate having any say in it via a referendum. The situation caused by those governments is now finally being redressed, isn't it, and fisheries is just a part of it. Leaving the EU will enable us to take control of our own fisheries situation to our advantage in the same way that it will enable us to take control over our borders, laws and money. The Fisheries Act gives us that legal certainty. Yes, it will take time to make those changes, and it will initially perhaps be prudent to have some interim gradual transition in hand, but it will be up to us legally how we manage that transition, who we allow to fish in our waters, the quotas that can be fished, how we conserve our fisheries resources. If we cannot arrive at that accord as part of a FTA, then the EU will have no right to any sort of access at all, so we hold the cards there Your usual obsession with graphs and charts gives an outline of the current situation, but makes no forecasts of how the situation will change now that we are in control. The remoaner establishment have always been only too happy to make doom-laden forecasts about the economy and industry, but seem to be reluctant to predict the future of fisheries. It seems that as far as you are concerned, because the situation in one thing now, it cannot be another in the ensuing decades. And yet the French don't think that way. They are worried sick that the end of their rights to treat our waters as a common EU resource will devastate their fisheries industry, as it will also be detrimental to Spain, the Netherlands, Denmark and Germany. Their problems are exacerbated by an EU decision to land 15% less fish from the Mediterranean. Could it be perhaps that the decline in the fortunes of the those EU coastal states' fisheries will coincide with an increase in the fortunes of ours? Is it beyond the bounds of possibility that we as a nation might develop more of an appetite in years to come for those species of fish and crustaceans that we export to the EU? Tastes in foods broaden with travel and also because of health concerns, as well as on economic grounds, so it will happen.

Both of you totally don't get the significance of what significant means, as you are only capable of comprehending it in an economic sense, but apparently because you do not balance your arguments to include them, you are both completely ignorant of the political implications. Produce as many graphs, bar charts and as much statistical analysis as you like, but that doesn't alter the political landscape one jot. Just to simplify it for you two, there are political implications affecting several coastal EU states. The French in particular are worried about Macron's chances of reelection if they have to surrender much of their rights that they had under the CFP and Boris is also worried politically at the implications for the Tories if he doesn't fulfill his manifesto promise to take back control of our coastal waters. As I have already pointed out, but you two have not argued to the contrary, the whole negotiation of a FTA with the EU could collapse because of just this one issue. This would be for political reasons, not because of economic ones. Does the penny drop yet?

So you'll celebrate the revival of our fishing enterprises and the economic boost it brings to our coastal communities once we regain control of our territorial waters, won't you?

Naturally it's insignificant to you remoaners, but it is one of the three red lines that we are unwilling to concede to the EU, so one would have thought that on that basis alone it would warrant some interest from the mainstream media. But as the mainstream media is so out of touch with the rest of the country outside of their own metropolitan bubble, it comes as no surprise. Thankfully there are plenty of other online news sources prepared to cover these topics, so all that the mainstream media is achieving, is the reduction of their credibility, their audience and influence.

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/flagship-fisheries-bill-becomes-law The Fisheries Bill receives Royal Assent and passes into law. Naturally there isn't much of a fanfare from our main broadcasting media about it.

Great news that we have agreed a trade deal with Canada, rolling over the EU deal. It is expected that next year an even better deal will be negotiated. Some remoaners on here made the ridiculous assertion that because it took the EU over 8 years to arrange the FTA with Canada, it would therefore follow that it would take the same amount of time for us to get one. Australia and New Zealand next and then a bloc deal between all of them with us to follow.

Really typical of you, Timmy, produce reams of graphs and statistics to cloud the argument and then go into patronise overdrive, attempting to show how clever you are and how thick your opponent must be. And all because I had the gall to mention that our trade with the EU had declined over the past decade, whereas it had increased with the rest of the world; at least I assume that must have been what triggered your little diatribe. Having lived through the time since before we joined the EEC, I know perfectly well how and why our manufacturing industry declined, the part that the trade unions played in its decline and our inability to compete with cheap labour in the developing world, especially the Far East. I know of the rise of the tiger economies of the Far East, and am grateful to that because it really boosted my pension which partly speculated on that growth. I am also perfectly well aware of where our strengths are, in banking, finance, service industries, high tech industries, science and pharmaceuticals, etc, so I don't need to be patronised by you about that I don't recall saying that we should try and compete with China or India, but we can certainly benefit from arranging our own trade deals with those growing rival trading blocs, now that we are free from the declining EU and able to forge our own future.

I've told you a thousand times not to exaggerate. Pardon me for mentioning in posts one of the three major subjects that are preventing the signing of a FTA with the EU. If you think that I'm indulging in "crazy rants" about fish, what must you think of Macron's outbursts? He's threatening all sorts of crazy measures in a vain attempt to browbeat us into submission over fisheries, so it must be important to him, even if you dismiss it so lightly.

What happens? Being of pensionable age means one has had life experience of the whole sorry episode of the Common Market/EEC and the creeping development of the federal EU? That one has experienced the decline of our manufacturing industries and the problems caused by the CAP and the CFP to our agriculture and fisheries until we have a trade deficit with the EU of some £100 billion, as the proportion of our trade with them reduces and our trade with the rest of the world increases? This current negotiations situation and our robust stance on not surrendering to your beloved EU's bullying is obviously riling you remoaners who still over four years after the referendum result have never been able to accept the electorate's decision and are reduced to hurling the usual insults. You know the ones, that Brexiteers are old and thick. The usual arrogant tosh, the sort that lost you remoaners the referendum, but you still haven't learnt from it even now.

That might be how you read it to mean, but that's you. I meant it to convey the current situation whereby we left the EU at the start of the year, have since then been involved in talks with the EU over a FTA, and have met a brick wall in those negotiations over several months because they will not treat us as an independent sovereign equal. We only require a similar deal to that signed by the EU with Canada, Japan, S. Korea. We have told them time and time again that we will not budge on our entirely reasonable insistence on retaining our fundamental right to govern ourselves and our coastal waters as we see fit, without interference from them and their rules and laws. It is against this background of the total intransigence of the EU and the belligerent attitude of the French in particular over fisheries, that I express the opinion that probably a majority of the electorate (who care either way) are heartily fed up with the EU's shenanigans and don't wish us to surrender to these bullying tactics, preferring instead to just walk away from the talks rather than waste time going round in circles. I expect that most, like me, would prefer a FTA, but not one that scraps those red lines of ours. If we allowed that to occur, it would cross the threshold of becoming a bad deal, the sort that a no deal WTO would be preferable to.

Do be a bit more careful about reading what I said before commenting on it. I invite you to read it again and then reconsider your response.

I give you the same advice that I gave saint1977; be patient, wait and see, it won't be long now. As we all know, you aren't exactly much cop at making Brexit predictions.

There is a lot of speculative guff printed in the media at the moment, pontificating on how we will have to cave in to the EU demands because of Biden/Cummings/the Chinese virus etc. I suggest that you wait and see what transpires. Be patient; you won't have to wait long.

When you take it upon yourself to talk in generalised terms of "people" and their hopes and desires for a particular outcome to these talks, you have to accept that there is probably a majority of the electorate currently who do not wish for us to cave in to EU demands (particularly from the French) that they have undiminished access to our coastal waters. Neither do those "people" want us to continue to be subservient to EU rules on how we should govern ourselves, or subject to the jurisdiction of their law courts. Put me among that majority. Apart from that, I have expressed my views often, that I would prefer a FTA based on the Canada one, but obviously with the none of our three red lines negotiated away in any form. If that is too much to ask of our so-called friends in the EU, then I'm perfectly happy with WTO.

Me too. I have my porridge made with milk, and I add sultanas. As you say, fills you up until lunch time, great for cholestral reduction.

It's largely irrelevant to talk about the past at this stage. The whole situation certainly was the responsibility of past governments, starting with Grocer Heath, but exacerbated by the CFP whereby our waters became a common EEC resource apart from a narrow coastal strip. Now that we have left the EU, it is in our hands to determine the future of the industry and hopefully the government will grasp the opportunity both to grow it back and also to protect the fish stocks in our waters.

😁They enjoy substantially less limited access to our territorial waters than we do. When they propose that they be allowed to continue with quotas at the levels they have enjoyed for the past 40 years, restricting us to a small proportion of our own resource, I'd certainly consider their access to be virtually unlimited by comparison. And why are we so concerned about an industry with such a small economic return? The answer ought to be obvious if one considers that any FTA with the EU might fall down over this issue and a couple of others; it is a matter of principle, of sovereignty. I realise that you remoaners don't consider it a worthwhile stance, but then you obviously fail to fully realise the political implications. You might also wonder why the French are so adamant that they will not sign a FTA unless we grant them the same access as before we left the EU, when fishing represents a very small percentage of their GDP also. Macron considers it important to his chances of continuing as President, and if Boris took the view that you lot do and capitulated, Heath like over this issue, then the electoral implications would be dire. You lot don't seem to recognise this.

What is also noteworthy, is the increasing panic of Ireland, who were very happy to act as the EU's lackey when they enabled them to weaponise the Irish border. It was working well under May's spineless and clueless government, but now that our negotiations are in far more capable hands, they are bricking it that there might be no deal, and that they will have been a major factor towards that scenario. In that situation, their economy will be the biggest single loser, as we are the biggest market for their goods. As it is, they are also being asked to cough up more per capita into the EU's Chinese virus slush fund than any other EU member state. Irexit cannot be too far behind.

Absolutely nothing to be sorry for. It's remoaners like you who believe that it will be an epic shit-show. Those who have wanted to free ourselves for some time from the control of the failing, federal euro-cartel gravy train are perfectly content, thank you. If we are doomed to ignominious failure by leaving the EU teat, one wonders why they are so intent on trying to restrict our ability to run our own affairs. It couldn't be that they are petrified that we will make a real success of it and become a serious competitor right there on their doorstep, could it?