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willing to serve, or by their fish merchants. The last are usually among the most capable and energetic of the members, but naturally they cannot be expected to work for reform in the methods of fish trading. On every Committee the practical sea fishery members are in a minority. Under various Acts, the Committees have power to regulate inshore fishing in a variety of ways -methods, gear, season, size of shellfish allowed to be taken-but before by-laws can become operative, they must be confirmed by the Central Department. The Central Department can confirm or reject, but it cannot initiate. It can only suggest, and leave the by-law to be brought up again. A more obstructive process for getting anything done quickly would be hard to invent.

For, although the Committees have unquestionably done a great deal of hard work, they themselves suffer from certain fundamental defects not their fault, but imposed upon them. (1) They are an example of spurious decentralisation; they are neither representative of, nor are they elected by, or responsible to, the interests they administer. (2) Their power extends only to the three-mile limit of territorial waters; that is to say, a steam trawler may scrape up hundredweights of immature fish 34 miles out, while the inshore fisherman, for the protection of the few small fish he can catch, may be prevented from trawling at all with motor power just inside the line; and he has, therefore, to bear the brunt of by-laws intended to improve fishing as a whole. (3) With one exception-the Lancashire and Western Committee-their funds are insufficient for enforcing properly their own by-laws, to say nothing of carrying out constructive work, the scientific research necessary for effective regulation, or the legal defence of fishing rights and facilities. (4) Meeting quarterly, at some railway centre the least inconvenient for the bad coastal communications of the country, the Committees are very remote from the men who have to earn their living on the sea and from the rapid fluctuations of the industry.

It is easy to see that on such Committees the members who say, 'Something's wrong, let's prohibit something!', and who produce a neat little by-law, all ready for adoption, are bound to gain the upper hand of members who want to work out constructive schemes, which

needs must be hazy to begin with, and which in any case can't be paid for. And, in fact, the coast is covered with an amazing network of by-laws, dissimilar and of unproven efficacy. Naturally, the inshore fisherman resents such interference by outsiders, however wellintentioned, with his fishing and grounds, his livelihood. 'What do 'em do for me,' he too often says, 'except try to prevent a fellow from earning his living? The Departmental Committee, whilst recognising fully the difficulties under which the Committees labour, and 'the keenest interest and the most intelligent devotion of a few sympathetic members,' was 'convinced that there are very serious drawbacks in the present system, which in our opinion fails either to stimulate local enterprise or to foster intimate relations between the fishermen and the Fishery Authority.'

If the Sea Fisheries Committees have concerned themselves chiefly with a maze of prohibitive by-laws, it must be recollected in their favour-in addition to the defects of their composition and representationthat the Act is father to the by-law, and that a repressive cast was inevitably given to their work by the Sea Fisheries Regulation Acts of 1888 to 1894. Parliament itself seems to have regarded the fisheries as a freegrowing tree, only needing to be pruned to flourish-a view which may have been true of the great steam ports, but was certainly untrue of the smaller fisheries. It empowered the Committees to 'regulate' the fisheries with by-laws and penalties, yet failed to provide them with funds for enforcing even such by-laws as are really necessary, let alone for carrying out constructive schemes. The one constructive provision of the Sea Fisheries Acts (1868-84)-relating to the better cultivation of shellfishprovided for the establishment of shellfish beds by means of Orders too expensive for fishermen to obtain !

Not until the Development Act of 1909 was financial provision made for the development of fisheries, as opposed to their regulation or administration; and it was out of an application to the Development Fund that the Devon and Cornwall Report arose. Grants were being made from the Fund for fishing harbours. The fishermen of Looe in S.E. Cornwall were converting their fleet to motor power, but the drift ports of West

Cornwall, owing largely to a succession of bad years and the competition of steam mackerel drifters from the East Coast, were in a state of great distress. And in Devon the smaller fisheries, at all events, had been 'suffering a steady decline.' The Devon and Cornwall Local Committees, seeing with admirable foresight that motors were bound to come, and might help their fisheries, joined hands in applying, early in 1912, for grants of 10,000l. each, for making loans to fishermen to instal motors in their boats. After considerable discussion and recrimination, and doubts as to whether Development money could legally be used for direct loans to individual fishermen, a small Committee of Inquiry was sent West. It visited practically every fishing port and village in the two counties, taking special care to learn the views of fishermen themselves. The Report, which appeared early in 1913, did not support the original schemes.

'Indeed, it is not impossible that fishing ports equipped with motor power by means of State aid might intensify the pressure that at present is exercised by commercial steam competition on neighbouring ports, and notably on the smaller inshore fishing stations. There is, too, the difficulty of selecting the individual fishermen, the pull of ports having preponderant or more active representation on the Committees, and a grave risk of patronage or favouritism. Though we have sought every suitable opportunity of informing ourselves on these points, we do not yet understand how it is proposed, under the scheme we have been invited to review, to proceed with the exceedingly delicate task of allotting the funds that may be applied for; and we must needs say that in regard to these same points-the most difficult parts of the matter in actual working-the schemes themselves are more than a little vague. We are persuaded that, in any scheme of State-aided credit, provision must be made for the close cooperation of the fishermen themselves in carrying out the scheme.'

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The Committee, therefore, recommended the foundation of fishermen's credit banks, which may be described briefly as co-operative societies for combining the small credit of all the members in order to borrow money for re-lending to those members who want loans-a method of turning character into security and credit into cash, of making financial bricks out of men of straw. A

subsidy of 30001. by way of loan on easy terms was suggested for the credit bank of each county, and an additional subsidy of 4000l. for the four distressed ports of West Cornwall, namely, Porthleven, Newlyn, Mousehole, and St Ives. Further, since the best method of installing motors in large trawlers, like those of Brixham, and in beach boats, had not been fully worked out, it was recommended that a grant of 2000l. should be made to the Devon Committee for that purpose. A Minority Note urged that credit banks, being novel, would take time to establish; that, as usually worked, they are inapplicable to fisheries, since fishermen, unlike small farmers, want largish lump sums for long periods once or twice only in a lifetime, so that the money cannot be turned over frequently; that the need of the West Cornish ports was pressing, if their fisheries were not to die out altogether; and that a loan of 4000l. should be made to them on the Sea Fisheries Committees' plan. A third part of the Report advocated improvements in fisheries administration and the subsidised foundation of a Fisheries Organisation Society for improving the shore business of the fisheries on co-operative lines.

In the end, a grant of 2000l. was made to Devon for the motor experiments, and a loan of 4000l. for 9-12 years to West Cornwall, on condition that the fishermen should be associated with the handling of the fund. Accordingly, a small Administrative Committee was set up in Cornwall; and early last year a Fishermen's Co-operative Society was founded in each of the four ports. Between twenty and thirty motors have been installed out of the loan; and there is evidence that the private conversion of the fleets to motor power has been decidedly stimulated. The atmosphere of the four ports is distinctly less discouraged; the scheme works smoothly; and one of its pleasantest features has been the keenness and good sense of the fishermen committees. If they earn money enough-and in that, after all, the fish will have the biggest say-no one doubts that they will repay the loan. Credit banks, on the other hand, are easier to talk about than to get into working order. The credit banks recommended in the Report have not yet been founded, and consequently the question of subsidising them has not arisen.

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Before the Report of the small Devon and Cornwall Committee was out, a heavy-weight Departmental Committee had been appointed To inquire into the present condition of the Inshore Fisheries [of England and Wales], and to advise the Board as to the steps which could with advantage be taken for their preservation and development.' It heard a mass of evidence in London, and, what was more important, it went round the coast to see and hear things for itself. Its findings can be read in its very full Report. Suffice it here to say that the advocates of the inshore fisheries were found not to have exaggerated either their value or their present state of decline. The official decorum of the Committee's language rather accentuates than veils the strength of some of its remarks; and its recommendations are pretty sweeping. These divide themselves under four main heads, namely, administration, facilities, fish (including shell-fish cultivation), and business organisation, including finance, marketing, fish-curing, by-products, etc.

Administration.-It was recommended that the Central Department should be strengthened in staff, funds and powers; that, in the composite Board, it should be raised from the position of a Division to a position coequal with Agriculture; and that its head should be a Permanent Secretary with direct access to the Cabinet Minister responsible. The cost of official fishery administration would be wholly a charge on national funds as in Scotland and Ireland; the making, repealing, simplification, and enforcement of all by-laws and regulations would be a function of the Central Department; and the Sea Fisheries Committees would be reconstituted as smaller advisory bodies, composed of nominees of the Central Department, representatives of Salmon Boards within the Districts, and direct representatives of fishermen's societies and associations, whose reasonable expenses would be paid. A most important recommendation was the division of the coast into four or five districts, and the appointment in each of a 'Resident Local Inspector,' not to enforce by-laws but to be in close contact with the Central Department on the one hand, and, on the other hand, with the fishermen and their difficulties. It was felt that such Inspectors, if well Vol. 224.-No. 444.

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