UKIP Leader Slams EU Fishing Policy

The EU Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) threatens to obliterate the UK's fishing industry entirely within 10 years, according to Nigel Farage, leader of the UK Independence Party. It is also fuelling the massive growth of economic migration and piracy in Africa, according to the party, which advocates reclaiming the UK's fishing grounds.

"We must regain control of our territorial waters and of our fishing and marine conservation policies as a matter of extreme urgency," said Mr Farage at a meeting with North Devon Fishermen at the new Appledore Fish Dock today.

"The EU itself has now admitted that 26 years of the CFP have been a complete failure, with 88 per cent of European fish stocks over-fished and 30 per cent being at risk. In fact, it has been an ecological, economic and political disaster. We must put a stop to it now, before it's too late."

Mr Farage claimed the direct cost of the CFP to Britain was £2.8 billion a year and the UK has lost almost 100,000 jobs since 1973. It was estimated the direct annual cost to Britain as being equivalent to the entire pre-tax profits of Tesco.

"The scandal of millions of dead fish being dumped back into the sea every year is now well known. Where British fishermen have landed fish rather than dump them, they have been prosecuted, ruined and in some cases imprisoned by our Government, acting for the EU, he said.

UKIP policy is for an immediate reinstatement of the UK's 12-mile territorial waters, with all foreign fishing banned; and a further 200-mile Exclusive Economic Zone in which fishing would be managed by the UK to ensure proper conservation of stocks.

"Our waters hold 70 per cent of Europe's fish, but we may not catch more than 13 per cent under EU rules," said Mr Farage. "Every other EU member state - many of whom subsidise their fleets - is entitled to a share, even if they're landlocked countries in Eastern Europe.

"What's worse is that the EU's industrialised fleets, having exhausted UK waters, are now plundering African fish, impoverishing already poor communities and leading a massive rise in emigration and piracy." Mr Farage described the Appledore Fish Dock, part-funded by the EU, as "an extreme irony".

"They're giving us back some of our own money, to build a facility they are working hard to make redundant as soon as possible", he said.

Words of Warning on RSA Quotas

I had been enjoying a superb autumn on Dungeness beach, catching large quantities of codling up to 8lbs. On my last trip before Christmas I packed up around 2am and couldn’t help but think how incredible it was, that from April I might have to report my catch to the authorities or risk breaking the law. This is because on December 18th 2008, with no prior warning, the European Commission announced that they intended to regulate sea angling.

Be under no illusion, this represents the biggest threat to our sport ever and we must stand up and fight!

The plan is to put sea angling on the same, discredited, quota system as used by commercial fishermen. It will mean that every private boat, yacht or kayak that wants to drop a line over the side will need a license. All fish landed will need to be reported whether caught from boat or shore.Once the quota for angling is used up, any fish taken could result in a fine of £50,000! Without an army of officials, the likelihood is that many sea anglers will just become criminals, as bad laws are always treated with contempt. The odd person will be unlucky though and face massive fines.

What is at stake here isn’t just the sport we love, but one of the last freedoms that we enjoy – It must be stopped! . Over the Christmas holidays I worried about the plan and I had plenty of time to do so as the easterly winds killed the cod fishing stone dead. On my return to Brussels I was even more alarmed to see the plans to put these measures through at breakneck speed.

We have to act now, as the final vote by the European Parliament is likely to be in April. I would strongly urge everyone in the angling community to oppose this proposal. There’s no point in writing to your local MP as all power over fisheries has been given to the European Union.

Visit the UKIP website, www.ukip,org and sign the petition to have Article 47 dropped.

Contact the MEPs for your area, they can be found at www.europarl.org.uk/uk_meps/MembersMain.htm

Tell them that you want Article 47 of the 'Council Regulation establishing a Community control system for ensuring compliance with the rules of the Common Fisheries Policy to be deleted. Clearly tell them you will not vote for them in the June 4th European Elections if they let you down.

Contact UK Fisheries Minister Huw Irranca-Davies at www.theyworkforyou.com/mp/huw_irranca-davies/ogmore and urge him to get Article 47 dropped.

If tens of thousands take the trouble to lobby, you will be listened to. MEP’s need your votes to secure their next five year term. You can put pressure on them.

I am appealing to angling groups in France and Holland and urging them to do the same.

Don't let Brussels bureaucrats ruin our sport and our industry.

Stand up and fight!

Nigel Farage MEP, UKIP leader

Bananas. And stuff.

We all know the EU is barmy. It has been barmy for a long time, and proved it conclusively when it introduced laws saying that bananas, carrots, celery, cucumbers and a whole variety of differing fruits and vegetables had to meet an exacting set of standards before they could go on sale.

After all, with all that evidence showing that crooked carrots, bendy bananas and crinkly cucumbers can give us all the foulest of diseases, the EU was acting to protect its citizens, surely?

What's that I hear you all cry? There is no evidence that misshapen vegetables are harmful? Then why would the EU introduce such measures? A common set of standards: sprouts must be a certain diameter or shoppers will get confused? I think not: I think its more to do with the desire to constantly exercise power.

Now, given that there has been a massive food shortage courtesy of turning our farmland over to the production of bio-fuels, and that fishermen already have to dump tons of perfectly good stock back into the sea to avoid strict EU fishing quota laws, perhaps allowing these mutant fruits onto our market might not be such a bad idea?

Well, the EU has partially come to terms with this logic. In an agreement reached on Wednesday, rules covering some fruits and vegetables are being relaxed, though not repealed entirely.

If, as our government would have us believe, this is still a sovereign nation, why do they not announce that they are repealing these rules themselves? Allow produce that doesn't meet exactingly stupid EU standards to be sold on markets: having more food available can never be a bad thing, surely?

Perhaps the reason they won't is that they are telling lies to the people, and that this is not now, and has not been for some time, a truly sovereign country.