Who doesn’t love the Beatles? Their music remains as relevant and popular today as it was 50 years ago. Perhaps this is because besides being entertaining, their songs had messages for us all. At present the key one for angling is to “Come Together” – because if we don’t, the future looks bleak.
Green Shoots?
To be clear, there are plenty of positives and green shoots of life that should inspire us to tackle the serious issues facing our sport. At P&DAA we’ve recently embarked on an ambitious coaching programme including our very own dedicated venue. We’re not the only ones and there are countless volunteers offering a taste of fishing to a new generation, supported by the Angling Trust and others.
Rivers such as the Thames and Trent are experiencing a renewed boom in coarse and specimen fishing, while top-level match fishing is strong. The digital age, with its videos, websites and social media, means that new and existing anglers alike needn’t be in the dark about how to fish.
Elephants in the room!
In spite of these positives, angling faces critical challenges in the modern world. There is not one elephant, but a whole herd of them in the room and while many of us seem determined to not see them, they threaten to trample everything we value.
Anglers face these problems daily. The issue is that we’re addressing them as individuals and far too slowly, while missing the bigger picture. While we argue about single issues such as otters, for example, on the same day cormorants and poachers took valuable fish, several thousand more died in an oxygen crash and big business continued poisoning entire ecosystems.
In short, there are so many issues at both regional and national level. Let’s not fool ourselves, we are in uncharted waters. Angling has NEVER faced so many challenges at the same time. The often repeated argument that we’ll strike a balance and nature will find a way is not only redundant but quite dangerous. Resting on our laurels never looked so risky!
If anyone is in doubt, perhaps I can make it crystal clear by listing just some of the issues we face at P&DAA. Feel free to add your own:
• Economy
Fairly overwhelming, right?
Unity is the only answer!
Complicating this further is perhaps the most serious issue of all, that we not only need to join up the problems, we need to join up the audience! Angling is plagued by partisan and frankly selfish thinking. Sadly, it is riddled with those who will criticise from the sidelines but will only lift a finger to help if it’s to launch another pointless keyboard attack.
Our current governing body, the Angling Trust, represents such a tiny proportion of its participants that it’s patently obvious why we struggle to affect real change on any policy level beyond angling.
The numbers alone are terrifying. Based on Environment Agency licence figures, there are around a million adult anglers in the country. The Angling Trust’s tally of around 15000 individual members therefore equates to only about 1.5% of anglers. Compare this to British Rowing, for example, that has half as many participants at best (504,100 in 2022) but double the membership for its governing body (29,866).
Lets be clear here, I want to applaud the Angling Trust’s ambition and enthusiasm. However, this needs to manifest results before it’s too late. Or we will see all those elephants arrive.
Why won’t anglers come together?
I see one major issue here - angling is totally under-represented. In reality this means it is underfunded and has to tow a very political line and bow to better supported powers like Natural England, DEFRA and the RSPCA.
Our sport is coming to the table like Oliver, saying ‘please sir, can I have some more?’. We’re satisfied with scraps, and until that changes we’ll be at the kids table while the grownups talk serious business at dinner. Collectively, we urgently need to act like grownups instead of holding onto that dummy on Facebook.
We want fair, reasonable and meaningful change to tackle that list above. Real anglers are environmentalists and wildlife lovers. We have absolutely no desire to kill anything or change everything. All we want is the ability to manage these issues in a controlled way, our slice of the pie. We’re not just here to deal with the end result of uncontrolled woke-ism.
Of course, no matter what the authorities do, we’re asking a lot. Angling is a peculiar sport in that so many people do very different things that bear little relation to each other - at least on the surface. To put it plainly, too many anglers simply don’t care about anything beyond the end of their own rod tip. But if you want that tip to keep going round, you need to get involved!
The messages might not be right just yet but if we all got behind angling, and that should be via the Angling Trust, things could change massively. Fishing would once again have a voice that could be heard in the crowd and we’d be able to affect real change.
So, let’s come together before it’s too late. Use your voice or lose it. It’s your choice.
For more info on Peterborough & District Angling Association, visit fishinginpeterborough.co.uk or visit the club’s Facebook Page
YOU CAN READ ANGLING TIMES' FULL REACTION ARTICLE TO THIS OPEN LETTER IN THIS WEEK'S MAGAZINE OR ON OUR MEMBER'S SITE.