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/  UK licenses EU supertrawlers which broke EU laws
UK licenses EU supertrawlers which broke EU laws
Just 100 EU ships account for over 50% of tonnage of EU fleet allowed in UK waters

Montage © Facts4EU.Org 2021

EU’s ‘factory ships’ and ‘supertrawlers’ plough British waters, under the EU trade
treaty
Out of the 1,700 licences the UK has issued to EU vessels to allow them to continue fishing in UK waters after Brexit,
the largest of these is for a ship that is enormous.
The Annalies Elena carries the Polish flag, is Dutch-owned, and is 472 feet long (144m) with a gross tonnage of over
14,000 tonnes. Its length is the equivalent of 13 London Routemaster buses laid end-to-end. Permitted to fish in Brexit
Britain’s waters, it has been prosecuted by EU member country Ireland and is unwelcome in certain other jurisdictions
around the world.
The second-largest, the Margiris, carries the Lithuanian flag, is 469ft long (143m) and has a gross tonnage of 9,500
tonnes. Current maritime geo-positioning shows this ship to be in the North Sea as of the time of writing (4am, Tues
05 Oct 2021).

BREXIT FACTS4EU.ORG SUMMARY

EU fishing fleet’s tonnage now licensed for UK waters in 2021
Total tonnage of EU fishing fleet licensed for UK waters : 425,265 tonnes
Total tonnage of UK fishing fleet after decades of EU Common Fisheries Policy: 203,703 tonnes
EU’s fleet by sheer tonnage, licensed for British waters, is twice the size of the UK’s in the UK's own
waters

25% of EU tonnage is accounted for by 1% of the EU vessels (18 ships)

40% is accounted for by less than 3% of the vessels (50 ships)
50% is accounted for by less than 6% of the vessels (100 ships)
The largest EU ship licensed by the UK is the equivalent of 13 London buses laid end-to-end
It is longer than a football pitch and its nets cover an area of more than 450 tennis courts
The 25 largest EU trawlers licensed to fish in British waters in 2021
 (../static/media/top_25_eu_supertrawlers.jpg)
© Brexit Facts4EU.Org - click to enlarge
[Data source: The official UK Government agency, the Marine Management Organisation.]

To give some perspective to what follows, smaller fishing boats are around 1-5 tonnes
The fourth-largest EU super-trawler licensed by British authorities this year is the Maartje Theadora, a German-
registered vessel with over 9,000 tonnes gross weight. In 2012 it was prosecuted by the French (of all countries) and
fined over £0.5 million for breaking EU law. It was stopped with £1m pounds’ worth of illegally-caught fish.
Here it is in the English Channel just three weeks ago.

(../static/media/maartje_theadora.jpg)
Above: The Maartje Theadora in the English Channel, 12 Sep 2021, credit: Greenpeace

EU’s ‘factory ships’ and ‘super trawlers’ ploughing British waters

[IMPORTANT: Firstly we must stress that there is no suggestion that any of the ships mentioned have broken any UK
laws. With UK fishing licences having been granted they are free to sail within the UK's 'Exclusive Economic Zone',
which extends to 200 nautical miles from the coast.]
Out of almost 1,700 fishing licences which the UK has issued to EU boats, there are enormous factory ships or ‘super-
trawlers’ which dominate fishing. For many years their fishing methods and the sheer scale of their activities have been
causing immense concern to other fishermen and to marine conservationists.
Whilst the UK Government has talked about banning these EU ships, they were all granted licences this year to allow
them to continue ploughing United Kingdom waters, including marine conservation areas from Scotland to the Isle of
Wight. In today’s report Facts4EU.Org is providing some simple facts based on our detailed analysis of the latest
licensing figures released by the Government’s Marine Management Organisation last week.
What are ‘factory ships’ or ‘super trawlers’?
There are no accepted official definitions for either of these terms. Descriptions, lengths, and tonnages vary according
to the part of the world and the organisations writing about them.
Below is the Helen Mary, number five on our list above. The Helen Mary is a German-registered supertrawler some
117m long, fishing in the North Sea in October 2020, courtesy of Greenpeace.

(../static/media/helen_mary_supertrawler_2.jpg)
© Suzanne Plunkett / Greenpeace
In general terms we are talking about massive boats, many of which have full capabilities on board for the automated
processing of the daily catches, as well as their chilling and freezing. These ships can stay at sea for up to two months
at a time and can produce daily catches of over 300 tonnes per day. Their nets can be up to 1950 ft long by 650 ft
wide (600m x 200m).
EU ‘fishing boats’ larger than Royal Navy’s guided missile frigates
For the purposes of this article we initially decided to look at EU ships licensed by the UK authorities which have a
gross weight in excess of that of a British Type 23 guided missile frigate (4,900 tonnes displacement), as this is quite a
beast.
(Note: Military ships are generally described by their ‘displacement’, which is the way of calculating their total weight.
Conversely, gross tonnage is used for commercial shipping and refers only to the storage capacity, not the entire
weight of the ship and its contents, so our figures are very conservative.)
It then became clear that a wider picture was emerging, of more than half the EU fishing fleet’s total tonnage
being accounted for by just 100 boats. That’s not even 6% of the total number of licences which the UK
Government’s agency has issued to EU vessels to fish in British waters.

OBSERVATIONS
'Plenty more fish in the sea?'
The EU (and in particular France) is currently threatening the UK over a few licences being held up for very small
French boats due to them not having the correct paperwork, despite them having been given extensions to
provide it.
It must be said that the French and EU threats are wholly unreasonable, given the way that the post-Brexit UK
has continued to allow the EU to take extraordinary quotas of UK fish, which for some species are more than
80%. In addition the UK has been more than generous in granting licences to the world’s largest supertrawlers,
which carry the flags of EU countries, and which have been banned by countries such as Australia.
Our report above shows the industrial scale of fishing that has been pursued by some EU countries, in some
cases with little care for the marine environment, according to conservationists. Meanwhile, the UK’s more
localised fishing industry has been devastated by the EU’s Common Fisheries Policy for decades. This has not
only meant UK fishermen from Scotland to Cornwall leaving the industry, it has also had a severe knock-on
effect for the coastal communities which have traditionally relied on their fishing fleets to help to drive the local
economies.
It remains a source of complete surprise to many people when they learn that the UK, an island nation
surrounded by the richest seas in the world, is a net importer of fish from the EU, by a long margin.
It will take the UK fishing industry many years to recover from EU membership, but the time to start this is now.
And a good start would be for the Government to move fast to ban super-trawlers from UK waters.
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[Sources: UK Marine Management Organisation 2021 | Vessel Finder | French media | Australian media | British Sea
Fishing | International Tennis Federation (for comparison with tennis court area) | Transport for London (for comparison
with London buses) | House of Commons Library research papers | Greenpeace] Politicians and journalists can contact
us for details, as ever.
Brexit Facts4EU.Org, Tues 05 Oct 2021
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Reader Comments 16

1. Richard Horton , Tuesday, October 05, 2021, 07:33:

Why Bojoke ?!
2. Lucy, Norfolk , Tuesday, October 05, 2021, 09:15:
Superb research as ever. Brexit was supposed to free us from all this but the EU's demands have apparently kept
us tied. The sooner we break completely free the better in my view.
3. Darren Walker , Tuesday, October 05, 2021, 10:53:
They were legislating and passing new laws in less than 18hrs just over 2yrs ago. To try and stop brexit. Or do
they only do this when it suits their lying woke agenda?
4. Soraya Vidakovic , Tuesday, October 05, 2021, 12:07:
Bojo….. the lying toad that has his strings pulled by the EU, gives brexit in name only.
5. Tom Jones-Parry , Tuesday, October 05, 2021, 14:21:
Not what was promised by this Government, they seem to make the sounds of independence but their actions tell
a different story.
6. Colin Duncan , Tuesday, October 05, 2021, 17:35:
I can't understand why these boats were licensed and who issued the licence to be able to fish our waters
7. Brian Emmerson , Tuesday, October 05, 2021, 18:53:
Get your act together Boris.
8. kb , Tuesday, October 05, 2021, 19:45:
Colin Duncan (6): the reason is because our government signed us up to an international treaty, the Trade and
Cooperation Agreement.
They had to trade our fishing grounds, or they would've cut our electric off. Our side would've thought, "hmmm...
UK fishing is toast anyhow, because they'll have nowhere to sell all that mackerel and herring, so let's go for the
electricity."
UK fisheries are in an agreed Transition Period of 5.5 years. After this period, access will be up for annual
negotiation. I'd put money on nothing changing then either.
 9. René , Tuesday, October 05, 2021, 21:35:
Well, a whiskey salesman was appointed, without consultation or any experience I might add, to negotiate your
Brexit. The agreement on the table is the one he negotiated. For a while Brexiters said it was a great deal & so did
he & all the Tories. The moment you all reached where the rest of the world have always been - it is suddenly
neither oven ready nor a great deal. As predicted, fish couldn't be sold & the whole industry was wiped out. Even
then, Brexiters said it was worth it & still a good deal.
You can't even vote out the negotiator because he was not elected (sound familiar?) & now has a title for the
"hard work" that even he is no longer happy with but was paid for. Makes you wonder if anyone actually read
what was being signed. Maybe your "think tank" needs to look at all the new trade agreements - just in case
someone has not turned the pages yet. Regardless, Brexit has been delivered, the Tories "got it done". The UK is
as sovereign as any nation can be outside the largest trade bloc as a 3rd country.
10. James Bertram , Wednesday, October 06, 2021, 08:17:
Traitors run our country.
16 comments, page 1 of 2
1 2 (https://facts4eu.org/news/2021_oct_eu_factory_fishing,2#comments)
» (https://facts4eu.org/news/2021_oct_eu_factory_fishing,2#comments)

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