SC(3) - AIW219

Sustainability Committee

Inquiry into access to inland water in Wales

Dear Sir,

Access to inland waterways

I am advised that following the recent opening of an inquiry into this matter by the Sustainability Committee at the Royal Welsh Show, you are now taking written evidence from interested parties. I hope that the following information will be given the attention which I believe it deserves and that it will help your Committee to arrive at a decision which will not disadvantage any of the parties involved:

• I am a member of the Afan Valley Angling Club, an organisation that controls and manages fishing on the River Afan that flows down through the Afan Valley into the sea at Port Talbot. Over the years, since its formation in 1951, the Club has acquired the ownership of the riverbed and most of the fishing rights to this river from its source to the estuary high water mark - those small stretches that it does not own the Club leases from the Forestry Commission. In addition to the entire riverbed, the Club also owns parcels of land adjoining the river;

• The Club currently has approximately 350 senior members, the greatest proportion of whom reside locally. In addition we have 70 junior members (aged up to 16 years old). In recognition of the economic deprivation that exists within the Club’s catchment area, every effort is made to keep membership costs to a minimum. Currently these are £45 per annum for seniors and £10 for juniors. The Club caters for disabled people by providing a number of wheelchair access points.  We also sell fixed term (daily and weekly) permits which enable visiting anglers to enjoy the sport that the River Afan offers whilst drawing in much needed income into the local economy;

• In an attempt to improve the quality of the sport available to its members, the Club has an on-going stocking programme (of brown trout) which commits the organisation to an annual expenditure in excess of £3,500. In addition, we are currently managing a salmon broodstock collection programme which is intended to "pump-prime” the existing salmon population by the introduction of some 25,000 parr each Autumn - this also costs the Club approximately £2,000 per annum. In recent years the Club, together with commercial partners (CORUS and ABP) and the Environment Agency Wales, collaborated to install screens that ensured salmon and seatrout smolts (juvenile fish) could return to the sea and not end up "land-locked” in Port Talbot docks. The Club contributed £25,000 to the cost of this project that has been hailed a major success;

• Prior to and since the formation of the AVAC in 1951, the members have worked hard and campaigned hard in order to restore the river from an industrial sewer pit almost devoid of life. The result is the stunning beauty that runs through the Afan valley rich in wildlife including, trout, eels, salmon, sea trout, otters and kingfishers. In addition to the benefits to wildlife this transformation has improved the lives of all who reside in the valley and even those who visit with it's many tree lined walks - trees planted by our members. Should canoeists be allowed "free" access to what is "our land" then I doubt there is sufficient finances available at the Assembly that could compensate the members for the many years of blood, sweat, tears and money that has been spent repairing the damage of the River Afan's industrial past. If they want it then they have to pay for it and there will be rules, strict rules and they will not be allowed to spoil my enjoyment so they can have theirs.

I am not against canoeing but they ain't having my river for free and to the detriment of my enjoyment!

• The Afan Valley Angling Club is confident that the existing legislation in respect of access is perfectly clear in that it is trespass to access a river above the tide which is in private ownership without the owner’s prior consent. For this reason the Club does not wish to see any changes to the current legal position;

• The Club has no experience of entering into access agreements with canoeists - none has ever been sought - the only contact with canoeists has been with those individuals who have obtained unauthorised access to the river. However, the Club is not opposed, in principle, to annually reviewed agreements, signed by both parties, which would allow canoeists to access the River Afan provided certain conditions were met e.g., during out of season months, on specific, predesignated stretches of the river and a commitment to making financial contributions towards reasonable river management costs;

• I would also like to take this opportunity to draw your Committee’s attention to the following points which I feel are important considerations which must be taken into account before a balanced judgement can be made:

• Allowing paddlers unlimited access to Welsh rivers is likely to be unlawful with respect to the Salmon and Freshwater Fisheries Act (1975) which protects spawning fish and, in the case of salmon & sea trout their redds, from disturbance;

• Canoeists give the entirely false impression - backed up by some ludicrous statistics - that they have little or no access to running water in Wales. To start with there is free navigation on all tidal stretches of rivers and Wales has the second highest tidal reach in the world! The tidal stretches of some rivers can easily amount to a quarter of their whole length.

• We object to the deceitful way in which the WCA has withdrawn from some perfectly good access agreements to try to show the Assembly that they don't have enough water, whilst still continuing to give ingress and egress points on maps in their website, so inciting trespass.

• The main reason why canoeists don't have more water to paddle in the upper reaches of rivers is that the WCA will not accept any restrictions to their paddling - for instance they will not accept that paddling should just take place in the six winter/early srping months when little fishing occurs. Unfortunately the WCA have pressurised local canoeing clubs to adopt the same intransigent attitude.

• Riparian owners and angling clubs have to endure almost constant trespass by canoeists who seem to think that they should be rewarded for their unlawful behaviour by the law being changed in their favour.

• Welsh anglers put a significant amount of both work and finance into Welsh rivers to improve the habitat and water quality that seems to have gone almost unnoticed. Anglers pay twice in order to fish: once to the EAW (£70 per annum for a migratory fish rod licence) and again in club fees or whatever to be able to fish a certain river or stretch of river. 

• Anglers don't pay to be able to take fish (which canoeists constantly maintain); they pay for the enjoyment of using someone else's asset. This is proved by the fact that coarse fishing clubs who return 100% of their catch still pay an annual rental to the riparian owner. Their members would think it very strange if they were given this water for free.

• The canoeists and now the Petitions Committee point to Scotland where the Scottish Land Reform Act (2003) gave open access to rivers and say that this would work in Wales. We believe it would not work and that it would be quite wrong to impose something similar here for the following, and many other reasons:

-Scottish rivers are on the whole much bigger than Welsh ones, so a group of maybe ten rafts going down a river say 3m wide is bound to have a much greater ecological effect than if the river is 10m wide;

-the numbers of major conurbations (L'pool, Manchester & Birmingham) a couple of hours away from north & mid Wales is much greater that similar sized urban areas to the Scottish Highlands, so far more canoeists/kayakers/rafters/gorge walkers would access smaller rivers;

-the main game fish in Scotland, the salmon, is much less wary than sewin, which are so important to Wales both economically and culturally.  Anglers from England and mainland Europe will not come to Wales and support local economies if big sea trout have been scared by canoeists above them and are therefore uncatchable.

-the amount of trouble there has been on Scottish rivers since the Land Reform Act was passed has been grossly downplayed. We hear from one correspondent that the upper Tay is "nothing but a war zone" with commercial rafting companies making angling virtually impossible.

• To change the law to allow unrestricted access on Welsh rivers would be a direct parallel to allowing the 'right to roam' on golf course. These areas were specifically excluded from the CRoW Act as they are commercial enterprises - but so are rivers.

• If the law was altered as canoeists wish, riparian owners and angling clubs would quite rightly require very large amounts in compensation from the Assembly for the reduction in value of their assets and the derogation of their leases respectively.

Regards

John Morgan