10lb fish from Spreadeagle to Nigel Smith on a Cascade.
Two fish thios week from Goodrich 10lbs Ally's Shrimp.
IF YOU DO NOTHING ELSE TODAY PLEASE READ AND RESPOND TO THIS;
A new
e-campaign has been launched - please have your say on the Welsh
access debate - take part now.
|
|
|
|
|
Take
action for rural Wales
Dear Sustainable Access Campaign Cymru supporter,
A new e-campaign has been launched to enable you to have your say on
the ongoing access campaign - take part here.
With your help, we persuaded the Welsh Government not to bring in new
legislation for access to the countryside when it published its green
paper on the subject in 2014. We were told that this was
because officials received an unprecedented volume of letters and
emails from supporters of the status quo.
However, the Government has now launched a new consultation which
could lead to new legislation opening up uncontrolled access to the
countryside, to include rivers for canoes and white water rafts.
We therefore need your help once again to persuade the Government
that this would be a disaster for the sectors of the rural economy
that depend on fishing, and that they should maintain the entirely
sensible policy of supporting Voluntary Access Agreements, which make
it possible for appropriate levels of access to be decided at a local
level to reflect the conditions on each river.
We would encourage you all to respond to this consultation
individually and as clubs. The Countryside Alliance has launched an
e-lobby direct to the consultation team and you can add your own text
to that letter. This is a short-fix and a more detailed comprehensive
response will be sent by the CA in due course, however, to ensure
that we have a large number of responses we would encourage you to
forward the link and get as many supporters as possible to sign up.
You can access the lobby at http://act.voteaction.uk/a/84 and the
Welsh Government consultation can be read in full here.
Alternatively, you can send a letter to Landscape and Outdoor
Recreation Branch, Rhodfa Padarn, Llanbadarn Fawr, Aberystwyth,
Ceredigion SY23 3UR or e-mail: AccessandOutdoorRecreation@Wales.GSI.Gov.UK
by 2nd October saying that you are responding to the
consultation on ‘Improving opportunities to access the outdoors for
responsible recreation’. You do not have to answer all the
questions; you can just send a letter stating your views. It
would also be helpful if you could write to your Assembly Member
letting them know that, as a voter, you do not support proposals for
uncontrolled access.
When responding to the consultation you might want to consider making
the following points:
We believe that Voluntary Access Agreements (VAAs) are the best way
to manage recreation responsibly on our rivers. For these to
work, the canoeing governing bodies need to accept that VAAs will
involve some reasonable restrictions on access to protect the
property rights of angling clubs and riparian owners and to manage
potential damage to the environment from watersports. This is
the only thing standing in the way of more waters being opened up to
canoeists.
It appears that some people in government think that Wales should
have a similar system to access as in Scotland, where there are very
few restrictions. The rivers in Wales are much smaller and less
numerous than those in Scotland and there are far more people living
in large cities near to those rivers. Even in Scotland there
have been some serious impacts on the fishing economy because of the
recent open access legislation.
Canoeists contribute very little to the rural economy; they tend to
visit for the day and rarely spend much. Angling by contrast
generates hundreds of millions for the economy, including millions in
rod licence revenue. There is scope for anglers and canoeists
to co-exist, but there need to be restrictions on canoeing to avoid
an increase in canoeing being at the expense of angling, which is
enjoyed by tens of thousands of people in Wales, including numerous
local angling clubs, and many visitors who tend to stay longer and
spend more than canoeists. Angling Tourism does not seem to feature
and we need to highlight its contribution to the economy.
You could also say that sustainable access to land and water must:
- be agreed locally between the relevant
parties to reflect the particular local conditions and pressures
rather than being generally imposed by national regulations.
- be managed to avoid conflict between users;
- respect the rights of people to continue to
enjoy existing legitimate activities without disturbance;
- not cause unreasonable interference with the
rights of landowners and lessees to enjoy their property;
- not damage the natural environment or the
ecosystem services it provides by causing damage to wildlife and
habitats.
Over the
past year, the Angling Trust and Fish Legal have spent many days and
thousands of pounds challenging the canoeing governing bodies in
Wales and England to stop putting out misinformation on their web
sites and publications which give the impression that the current law
relating to access to rivers is unclear. Some progress has been
made, and the governing bodies have changed some of the statements in
some areas of their web sites. However, there remains a
widespread misconception that the law is not clear, and the Angling
Trust and Fish Legal have hired a barrister (an eminent QC) to give a
formal opinion to inform governments and the general public and to
provide further challenge to the canoe governing bodies.
SACC is also looking into the cost of attending all the Welsh Party
Political Conferences early next year to highlight the campaign. This
will be very expensive to facilitate, however we feel that it is
crucial to the campaign. Each conference will cost approximately
£1,500.
If you haven’t yet made a donation to the SACC, or if you could
afford to make another donation, please send a cheque payable to The
Angling Trust to Eastwood House, 6 Rainbow Street, Leominster,
Herefordshire, HR6 8DQ. Please mark your donation clearly for
SACC and it will be devoted to SACC expenditure. Many thanks.
Thank you very much for your support and please don’t forget to
respond to the consultation and/or write to your Assembly Member.
All best wishes
The SACC team
|
|
|
|
|
|
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: only a member of this blog may post a comment.