Notes of National Angling Advisory Group Meeting

Notes of National Angling Advisory group meeting

Wednesday 28 March 2018

Trust’s Hatton office.

1 Attendees and apologies for absence

Ian Trayer (Chairman), Peter Birch, John Ellis, Peter Henery, David Kent, Kye Jerrom, Andy Strickland, Dick Pilkinton, John Johnson, John Castle, Dennis Hunt & Peter Fieldhouse. Apologies for absence were received from John Sutton.

2 Notes of previous meeting and matters arising not covered elsewhere.

It was confirmed that the notes were an accurate reflection of the discussions at the previous meeting.

It was agreed that it would be useful for a senior member of the Trusts Enterprise and Fundraising team to attend a future meeting to explore with the group what potential fundraising options for fisheries and angling might exist.

JE and PH were in early stage discussions with Angling Direct regarding coaching and other opportunities.

JE confirmed that the input from the additional NAAG meeting on December 6th had been most useful and has been included in the internal report regarding the future structure and role of the team. DK reiterated the view that angling clubs very much saw themselves as paying customers rather than local interest groups or users. The group felt the reorganisation represented a great opportunity to further develop and improve communication with angling clubs on the ground.

There was concern expressed from several quarters that the lack of communication between the Vegetation Management programme of the Environment Team and canal users was causing problems. This could potentially be solved if this and other national works programmes were placed online as soon as they are available. This would be very welcome and provide sufficient time for feedback, especially around timings to fit around clubs planned events.

It was agreed that the F & A team would contact all customer clubs with their key local and national Trust contacts once the regional structure was in place.

Whilst no further progress had been made with the development of the heritage fishing tackle display, members felt that there was a strong link with the Let’s Fish Campaign and the getting adult anglers back into fishing component of the Angling Trust contract. JE to action as time permits.

RP confirmed that police intervention around the issue of unsafe fishing underneath overhead powerlines at Bulbourne had led to positive outcome with the culprits being issued with a formal warning by the police. It was noted that the electricity industry had responded to the public endangerment issue. An additional bonus was that the local police rural crime officer had attended the club’s AGM and was taking an active interest in fisheries law. Members felt that a blog article on overhead powerlines and angling would be useful. JE to action.

3 Chairman’s Comments

IT reported on a scurrilous article that appeared in ‘PikeLines’, the quarterly publication of the Pike Anglers Club. It was written by John Tate, a former Chairman of Barnt Green Fishing Club, and contained a series of wild, outrageous (and untrue) comments about the Fishing Club and the Trust. It was picked up by the Trust’s outreach service. The first reaction of IT and JE was to respond vigorously but when it became clear it was a private Club publication and the Editor, on the website, disclaimed any responsibility for his author’s opinions, it seemed best to let it go.

4 National Fisheries & Angling Manager’s Update Report.

4.1 Fisheries staffing structure, short term arrangements.

Paul Breslin has taken a secondment for 12 months with the Environment team, North West waterway from 15th January 2018. Given the impending restructure, it has been decided not to replace Paul on a like for like secondment basis. JE will act as Fisheries & Angling Manger for the four northern waterways.

Peter Henery has been contracted to manage the Let’s Fish campaign and Martin Stark to assist JE with fisheries technical issues and revamping the FAAP documents to bring their content into line with the new regional boundaries. Management of the Tees Barrage fish passage work has now passed to the F & A team and Martin has also been contracted to manage this.

4.2 NAAG Retirements and new appointments

Alan Hughes, Dan Griffiths, Dennis Hunt and Andrew Wedgbury will officially commence their appointments on 1st July 2018 for a period of three years. Messrs Pilkinton and Fieldhouse will continue as group members until December 2019, an 18-month extension. Both have extensive experience in angling participation in what could potentially be a significant period of expansion of the Trust’s work in this area. John Sutton has also agreed to remain as part of the group until December 2019, a 12-month extension. David Kent is to be offered a third and final three-year term from July 2018. John Castle and John Johnson will retire from the group in July 2018. The next tranche of vacancies will be advertised in early 2020.

4.3SSSI Site Management Framework. Fish Population and Fisheries Management.

The group welcomed this document as a significant step forward in incorporating sound fisheries management at the Trust’s 63 SSSI’s. The document will be formally signed off by the respective CEO’s at a public launch in the early summer.

4.4 Standard Angling Agreement Document Update

It was agreed that a new clause pertaining to Check, Clean and Dry should be added with immediate effect along the lines of ‘undertake reasonable endeavours to ensure that permitted users carry out appropriate Check Clean & Dry measures’. It was suggested that an accompanying blog article linked to existing advice would be useful.

It was confirmed that clause 5.7 had been incorporated into the agreement as follows ‘the Trust are to use reasonable endeavours to inform the Licensee in advance of any fisheries management activity to be carried out by the Trust, the Environment Agency or other third parties authorised by the Trust and to invite the licensees to attend the operation where safe to do so’

4.5 Zander management update Grand union & other locations.

JE confirmed that zander removal work is currently ongoing at the following locations

• Grand Union Canal Three Locks north to Whilton Marina (Buckby Bottom Lock) where around 800 zander weighing over 1900 lbs had been removed in March 2018. • Grand Union Leicester Line South Kilworth to Kilby Bridge (including the Foxton to Kilby Bridge SSSI) • Ashby Canal (whole of) including the Ashby SSSI • Trent & Mersey. Stoke on Trent & Stone areas.

It was noted that controlling clubs on the Grand Union have made financial contributions of around £5000 to support this work. Unfortunately, Old Bury Hill fishery have not yet completed the fencing work necessary to enable zander to be transported live to this fishery. Following a discussion around KIFR permits, it was agreed to explore potential options for totally enclosed stillwater sites in the Fens or possibly in the Severn or Avon catchments. The Trust have compiled two blog articles for invasive non-native species week, one with the help of the EA on the perils of top mouth gudgeon and one focussing on zander, complied by Dr Phil Smith whose doctorate thesis focussed on zander on turbid Midlands canals.

It was agreed that the Trust standard marina access agreement need to be reviewed to better cover fisheries management activities and clarify fishing rights situation. PB & JE to take forward internally with colleagues.

4.6 Middlewich branch breach

A major embankment failure occurred between Stanthorne Lock and Wardle Lock in the early hours of Friday 16th March on the Shropshire Union Canal Middlewich Branch, which consequently has been drained. MEM Fisheries staff spent a full day on Saturday 17th March rescuing nearly 10,000 roach, perch, gudgeon, bream and eels (largest eel was 4lbs) from the three-quarter mile length. The fish were released further along the canal beyond Wardle Lock, towards Middlewich town centre around the confluence with the Trent & Mersey. JE confirm that to the best of his knowledge there were no non-native invasive fish species present at this location and therefore there were no issues of escapees into the Weaver catchment.

4.7 Earlswood Reservoirs Update.

Following a KIFR enforcement notice from the EA, the Trust agreed to drain Engine pool to remove Wels catfish, a non-native fish species. The reservoirs overflow into the Blythe SSSI. The valves were also in need of urgent repair, so the work was undertaken concurrently. Around 30,000 lbs of fish were rescued, a biomass of circa 1300lbs per acre, predominantly carp. The restocking venues for carp included Trench Pool, Thorpe Lea, Clattercote, Harthill, Lower Gailey and the Grand Union Canal Leighton Buzzard. Most of the silver fish were relocated into Windmill Pool with some transferred to the Grand Union Canal at Wigston & Leighton Buzzard for fish population reinstatement following previous fish mortalities. Despite the complete emptying of the water and electrofishing of the pools, not a single catfish was recovered.

4.8 Bittell Reservoir Update

The fish rescue was completed during early November. Work is currently behind schedule and it may not be possible to undertake much fishery reinstatement prior to the autumn of 2018.

4.9 Competitions update.

The stillwater championships has been renamed the Boddington classic and all available pegs sold out within 14 days.

James Lewis (Angling Trust) is looking to launch a series of 12 to 24-hour long carp matches, using some of the Trusts reservoirs. (Clattercote & Boddington with the final at Barston)

The Trust had been approached by Gary Palmer who has expressed an interest in running a lure fishing championships, comprising of six regional heats with an inner-city final in central Birmingham We will share his proposals with the group once we have them in writing.

The steering group recently met and approved some minor amendments to the CRT/AT competition rules. Tickets for the 2018 canal pairs championships went on sale on 19th March. Again, there are 16 heats with the final on Saturday 20th October on the Staffs & Worcester & Trent & Mersey. In the autumn, there will be a requirement to revisit the qualifying heat categories to align with the new regional structure, perhaps having two qualifiers per region plus the Scottish & Irish heats plus 2 organisers picks’, a combined total of 16 qualifying heats.

The steering group have also agreed to make some more substantial changes to the junior canal championships. It’s been agreed to split the event into two age group categories

• 10 to 15 years old inclusive • 16 to 18 years old inclusive.

Peter Henery has been asked to lead on the promotion increased attendance at this event with a combined target entry of 50 individuals. It was agreed he would set up a steering group accordingly. Angling Trust will continue to take the bookings and the pegging on the day will be organised locally. Bob Dyer has again agreed to provide the results service. Some sponsorship had been obtained from Angling Direct.

4.10 Unlocking the Severn update

The stage 2 Heritage Lottery Fund submission was submitted during the week of 12th March 2018 and the outcome expected during June. JE continues to represent the Trust on the fish monitoring sub group with further monitoring work in hand for April and May

4.11 Website & Social Media Update

The team has nearly 29,500 Facebook followers and just shy of 1000 Twitter fans. Around a dozen team blogs had been published since the November meeting.

4.12 Angling Trust Angling Improvement Fund

The Trust submitted a bid for a further tranche of level one coaches associated with clubs likely to become partners in the 2018 Let’s Fish campaign. Due to staff time constraints, no further bids were submitted by the Trust.

4.13 Kiveton Fishery. Following a recent tender exercise in which around 30 candidates expressed interest, an agreement for the fishing rights has been granted to Jonathan Longsden, (he owns the local tackle shop, 6 am Tackle with his father) and has a fisheries management degree from Sparsholt. The fishery now becomes part of the Trusts commercial fisheries portfolio.

4.14 In house fish and fish rescue video e-learning module

Following a useful review by Peter Birch, it has been agreed to split the fisheries area into three modules as follows

• An introduction to fisheries & angling • Angling clubs and anglers as customers • Fish rescues

4.15 Magnet Fishing

The Trust had recently amended its magnet fishing advice on the website, warning of the health and safety risk of unexplored armaments

5 Restructure Update

PB updated the group on the timescale of the upcoming senior management appointments including the six regional directors. He confirmed that he and JE would be meeting with Julie Sharman, Chief Operating Officer in the next few weeks to determine the future priorities of the teams work and where they will sit in the new structure. New regional boundaries would be confirmed imminently. Fisheries were well placed to deliver many of the Trust objectives around health and wellbeing.

6 Waterway Partnerships/Regional Advisory Boards

The ten waterway partnerships will be replaced with six regional advisory boards with new chairmen being recruited imminently. Some individual members may be invited to carry on for a twelve-month period. The role of the new advisory boards will be work with the regions to help deliver Trust objectives.

7. Moorings update

A meeting was held on August 17, 2017, between representatives from NAAG (JE, IT, RP, AS, and Terry Fell {co-opted}) and Jon Horsfall, the acting Head of Boating, concerning the relationship of anglers with boaters, especially focussing on ‘Sharing the Space’ issues. The principle of the 5-metre rule at winter moorings, where boats should leave a 5-metre gap between each other to allow space for fishing, is written into the Terms and Conditions for Winter Mooring but is rarely exercised. NAAG hoped something similar could be introduced into the General T & C for Boat Licences. The Group recognised the complexities of this issue and the challenges of enforcement. An equitable sharing of space was key to the successful running of Angling Clubs and several had reported that lack of access to their rented fishery, especially in winter, made it difficult to justify continuing to pay their rent. Although NAAG’s arguments seemed to be met with sympathetically, the recent re-organisation of the Trust and the change of roles of many of the senior ’players’ means that this issue will almost certainly have to be re-visited in the near future when the re-organisation is complete.

The discussion moved to the issue of abandoned unlicensed boats. PB explained the S8 process for the removal of craft. It was agreed to invite Paul Griffin from the Boat Licensing Customer Support team to a future meeting. It was noted that boat licence evasion had moved from double digits to below 5% in the past few years, vindicating the decision for the business to focus on evasion as a high priority activity.

8 Lets Fish Update Plans for 2018

JE led on a presentation to the group. He firstly highlighted the important link between the National Angling Strategy and our current angling development work. He went on to look at the successes and lessons learnt from the 2016 and 2017 campaigns. The EA data for rod licence sales over the last 8 years showed significant trends; whereas the total number of junior licences sold was down 60%, this was off-set somewhat by an increase of 35% in senior licences sold. However, the overall trend of total licences sold was down 25%. This pointed towards a different approach being required in the future to reverse the trends in the participation of (adult and omit these two words) junior anglers. The group concurred with the concept that (section omitted) the best way of converting first timers into lifelong anglers was via an angling club participation pathway. A one-off taster session was not quite enough and there was currently excessive emphasis on the collection of data rather than the actual coaching of participants. Some debate took place around the merits of natural fisheries with natural stock densities as being the best places for newcomers to learn the skills necessary for become lifelong anglers.

The group agreed that the Trust was uniquely placed to deliver participation with 52% of the population of England & Wales residing within 5 miles of a Trust fishery. However, the group was mindful that many of these fisheries needed to be improved to make them fit for purpose as sustainable fishing venues, as highlighted in the FAAP’s. It was agreed there was a need to work to re-enthuse clubs, a proportion of whom had become despondent as to the prospects of reinvigorating their junior section. There was an urgent requirement to find and train more coaches with basic canal fishing expertise to work at club level and an element of frustration expressed as to the time it takes for an applicant first expressing an interest to becoming qualified. The group agreed that collaboration between clubs was vital, a successful example quoted being the five clubs in the south east waterway (Luton, Tring, Milton Keynes, Northampton Nene and Wellingborough Nene) who shared coaches and compiled schedules of events collaboratively.

JE went on to explain the detail of the 2018 programme, made possible by the 20k funding from Angling Trust. Development of the events itinerary, appointment of coaches, promotion and advertising would be undertaken by Peter Henery. The group concurred that nationally consistent approach was essential. The Angling Trust delivery target was for 4000 participants. A CPD day was being held on 12 May at Hatton with around 35 places available for existing L1 and L2 coaches. We have set an initial target of 25 partner clubs and groups each delivering one canal flagship plus four further follow events. Discussions would be held imminently with our Explorers team and the Desmond family canoe trail team to see how we can incorporate angling participation delivery into their schedules.

A discussion took place around the challenges of the lapsed angler market. The group suggested that the Trust could use opportunities at the fish tank display and more general waterway events such as Crick Boat Show etc to engage with lapsed anglers and their families. JE agreed to explore options of lapsed angler surveys at these events as well as developing a heritage tackle display as a focus point to begin discussions

The discussion ended on a note of realism. It was understood and agreed that the current funding for Peter Henery would not be available once Paul Breslin returned from secondment. Any ongoing work from the beginning of 2019 could only be undertaken if sustainable funding was in place.

9 Angling Development 2019 and beyond. What should the Trust’s ambitions be?

A discussion took place as to whether the Trust should consider bidding directly to the EA for an angling participation contract or was the Trust better placed to work as a sub-contractor for the Angling Trust (or possibly other successful partners). The group advised that the latter route was the best option at this stage in the Trusts evolution and given our current fisheries resource. The group also advised that we should not rule out working collaboratively with the angling trade and its representative organisations to help us deliver angling participation sustainably.

10 Any other notified business

JC has asked that the issue of complimentary fishing facilities for volunteers be revisited It was agreed that we would explore what could be done within the current volunteering rules.

Date of Next meeting

It was agreed to provisionally change this from 25 July to Wednesday 18 July with a view to exploring the possibility of incorporating a Let’s Fish session for managers in the afternoon or early evening. JE/PH to source suitable venues.