mr president i must declare an interest in this subject
i am a lifelong keen sea angler as are most of my family
i enjoy this because it is one of the last basic freedoms that we have
we can go onto the beach or out in our boats catch a few fish and take them home to eat
now for some years recreational sea anglers have been lobbying for their sport to be included as part of the cfp
i have said for years be careful what you wish for
well now it has happened and it is called article forty-seven and it is called this maltese commissioner joe borg
there are over one million of us in britain we are conservation-minded we are sensible
we do not need regulating mr borg by the likes of you
that is why we need an outright rejection of article forty-seven because nothing else will do
if you get this power you can come back year after year
we may say now that beach angling has been exempted but once it is under the auspices of people like you mr borg you can come back next year or the year after and start to regulate it
as far as boat angling is concerned the door with all of this is open for everybody being required to have licences and to report
any mini-victory that we feel that we won at committee stage by changing the words member states shall to member states may <unk> to collect this data is lost i am afraid with defra back home i feel they will take any opportunity to use eu rules to control us in any way that they can
sea angling needs encouragement
we should be building offshore reefs
we should be recognising as the americans have done the enormous economic impact that it can have
instead we have a common fisheries policy that has been an environmental disaster already
it is prejudiced against the british working fleet and it will now ruin sea angling in britain if we give this man and people of his ilk power
so commissioner borg my advice is sling your hook
