The Cruising Association has launched a campaign to make lobster pots safer for small vessels and is asking sailors to sign the petition
A petition launched by the Cruising Association to make marking of lobster pots safer is again live after it was shut down by the Government until after the General Election.
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/200001
The CA’s petition obviously hit a nerve with the boating public as not only did the petition receive nearly 6,000 signatures in two weeks but the CA has received hundreds of e-mails from people in the UK and worldwide telling of their experiences. Not only were boats severely damaged – some unrecoverable – but hundreds of lives were put at risk when their boats became entangled in the lobster pot tethers.
Thanks to everyone who has expressed an interest in the CA’s safety campaign which is backed by CA patron, Sir Robin Knox-Johnston and Yachting Monthly.
A spokesperson for the CA said: ‘We think it is time for everybody with an interest to work together to find a solution, particularly one that is cheap and practical for our fishermen. With this aim, the CA hopes to secure a government consultation about the effectiveness of the current guidance and the merits of enforceable regulations for the whole of the UK. We have been working to establish a consensus amongst interested parties, including representatives of fishermen’s organisations as well as the RYA, RNLI and others concerned with yacht safety.
‘A key issue is to establish good solid data to support the case for action. Many incidents go unreported. We need to demonstrate the scale and cost of the problem. The RYA has recently relaunched a reporting form which aims to bring all the necessary information together at one collection point, here:
If you support the CA’s campaign, please:
- sign the petition – https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/200001 – even if you had already done so, as previous votes can’t be carried over
- carry on reporting incidents to us via lobsterpots@theca.org.uk, and go to the link to fill in the new RYA form
