Brexit campaign leader and former UKIP chief Nigel Farage is joining a symbolic boat-burning in Whitstable as fishermen protest their “betrayal” by Government in the Brexit negotiations.
The #CoastalCommunitiesCount protest is being organised by Fishing For Leave, the grassroots organisation which was behind the seminal Battle for the Thames between ordinary fishermen and middle-class Remain activists — mostly students — led by Irish millionaire Bob Geldof.
Other protests have been organised in Milford Haven, Newcastle, Portsmouth, Plymouth, and Hastings, with around 200 fishing vessels taking part — but nothing is expected to match the Whitstable demonstration at 5 p.m., which will see a boat draped in EU flags lowered onto a bonfire and symbolically burned.
The ‘transition deal’ which Theresa May is seeking with the European Union will leave the fishing industry remain under EU control via the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) for another 21 months.
It has suffered tremendously throughout Britain’s membership of the bloc, with the fleet losing 60 per cent of its strength and around 100,000 job losses at sea and onshore, due to Brussels allocating a majority of the fish stocks in Britain’s once-rich fishing waters to other EU countries.
Fishing for Leave say remaining subject to EU rules will not just mean another two years of hardship, but the virtual annihilation of what remains of the industry — leaving EU countries able to use international rules to claim Britain’s fisheries even after the transition is over.
“We implore the public to get behind and support their fishermen and to invite friends, family and fellow Brexiteers to watch and show support – bring plenty flags and banners,” said a Fishing for Leave spokesman.
“The ‘transition’ is not just a 21-month delay but a death sentence for what’s left of the British fishing industry, as the EU will be free to enforce and impose detrimental rules on us to cull what’s left of the UK fleet.
“This would then allow the EU to use international law, UNCLOS Article 62.2, which says if a nation no longer has the capacity to catch its own resources it must give the surplus to its neighbours,” he explained.
“The EU would be free to easily eradicate what is left of our fleet and has every incentive to do so.”
“Our nations fishing and communities were surrendered to the EU and have suffered immeasurably through EU mismanagement,” the spokesman blasted, referring to an infamous memo released decaded after Britain first entered the EU — then called the EEC — which revealed that the Government had deemed the industry “expendable”.
“The vote to leave provides a golden opportunity to automatically repatriate all our waters and resources, worth £6-8 billion, and to start new policy to rejuvenate our coastal communities and industry.
“Fishermen are sickened and enraged that our government has capitulated to obeying all EU law after Brexit, consigning us to remaining trapped in the disastrous CFP until January 2021, and possibly trapped forever in exchange for a deal trade.
“The transition is a second betrayal of fishing, of the Brexit vote, of an opportunity and is a second surrender of our communities.
“Our communities might not matter to them but they matter to us. Coastal communities count. MPs better remember that and that no deal is better than a bad deal, or these flotillas will just be the start.”
It is not too late for the Government to walk away from the transition deal or attempt to amend it, according to the principle that “nothing is agreed until everything is agreed” — but Brexit supporters are increasingly sceptical that Theresa May’s Remainer-dominated Cabinet has the mettle to walk away.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.