‘Taking back control’ of our waters has become a totemic rallying cry for Brexiteers, but what really lies behind the decline of coastal fishing communities, and is the EU just a convenient scapegoat?
Thread (1/x)
Thread (1/x)
Modern fishing trawlers were first developed in the Devon village of Brixham, and were sold to ports such as Scarborough, Hull, Grimsby, Harwich and Yarmouth, enabling Grimsby to become the largest fishing port in the world by the mid-19th century. (2/x) 
Historically, territorial waters had only a three-mile limit, determined by the distance that cannonballs could be fired from the shore. Waters outside this limit fell under the 'freedom of the seas' principle, which suited the UK as the dominant naval power of the 1800s. (3/x)
British trawlers covered large distances, fishing in waters off the coast of Iceland and even as far as Canada and Russia. This documentary follows the trawler St Dominic from the Humber as it trawls three miles off the Russian coast in the White Sea. (4/x)
In 1952, Iceland extended its limit to 4 miles. The UK retaliated with a landing ban on Icelandic fish, but with the Soviet Union looming on the horizon, the USA stepped in to blunt the effect of UK sanctions and in 1956 the UK reluctantly agreed to the new limits. (5/x)
Still concerned about overfishing, in 1958 Iceland again extended the limit to 12 miles, initiating the first of the co-called Cod Wars. This time the UK sent in the Royal Navy to prevent the Icelandic coastguard enforcing the limits. (6/x)
The conflict lasted until 1961 when, following the UN Conference on the Law of the Sea, the UK reached an agreement with Iceland that included limited fishing rights for three years and an acceptance of the new territorial limits. (7/x)
In response to falling fish stocks, Iceland announced a further extension of the limit to 50 miles in 1971. This unilateral move was opposed by most European states, but Iceland was not deterred and the new limits came into force in September 1972 (8/x)
British trawlers mocked the Icelandic coastguard by playing Rule Britannia or Land Of Hope And Glory over the radio but were confounded by a new tactic of cutting the trawl wires using a device developed by Iceland during the first Cod War. (9/x)
The UK government agreed to send in the Royal Navy to escort the trawlers. Commenting at the time, Defence Secretary Lord Carrington said he hoped this would “bring the Icelanders to the conclusion that there isn’t any future in this”. (10/x)
Amid calls from some Icelandic politicians to invoke NATO Article 5 in the face of what they saw as British aggression, the Secretary General of NATO Joseph Luns was called in to mediate, remarking pointedly that Iceland was vital as a “huge unsinkable aircraft carrier”. (11/x)
The conflict ended with Britain accepting the new 50-mile limit and agreeing a temporary quota that lasted two years from November 1973. (12/x)
Following the second Cod War, Britain had two General Elections in 1974 which saw a Labour government elected that was bitterly divided on the issue of Europe, with cabinet ministers such as Tony Benn, Barbara Castle, Peter Shore and Michael Foot opposed to membership. (13/x)
Labour’s policy was to renegotiate EEC membership terms before holding a referendum, so it’s noteworthy that fishing wasn’t one of the big issues on the agenda given that it is now received wisdom among Brexiteers that joining the EEC was the cause of the problems. (14/x)
After the 1973 agreement expired in 1975, Iceland feared that the continuing decline of fish stocks threatened the survival of their own industry and extended the limit to 200 miles to make it easier to enforce. (15/x)
The editor of Iceland’s main newspaper Morgunbladid, Styrmir Gunnarsson, explained that the UK government’s approach to negotiations was seen as arrogant and inconsistent: “I don’t think you should send Mr Hattersley again to Iceland.” (16/x)
In 1976 the diplomatic dispute escalated further with Iceland breaking off diplomatic relations with the UK, and threatening to close the strategically important NATO base. (17/x)
Under pressure from NATO and the US to resolve the dispute, the UK accepted the 200 mile limit and a drastically reduced quota of 30,000 tonnes, down from 117,000 tonnes under the previous agreement. (18/x)
Despite promises of retraining and assistance from the government, little help reached the communities affected with what compensation there was being directed towards trawler owners for decommissioning. (19/x)
Roy Hattersley later characterised defeat in the Cod Wars in terms of Britain’s imperial retreat: “British foreign policy is full of occasions when we’ve withdrawn from things. Normally we kill a lot of people first…” (20/x)
It was not until 2000 that the UK government awarded compensation to the trawlermen whose livelihoods had been damaged, and there was a further decade-long struggle to extend the scope of the scheme to cover more fishing towns. (21/x) news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/856180…
So what about the EU’s Common Fisheries Policy? Isn’t the problem that EU members have unfettered access to UK waters? As with most Brexit arguments, the truth is nothing like as simple as that. (22/x)
Under the CFP, each member state is responsible for how its national quotas are allocated. The UK allows most of its quota to be traded on the open market. This is what has resulted in much of the ‘UK’ quota being owned by foreign entities. (23/x)
blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/201…
blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/201…
In the clamour to manufacture justifications for Brexit, the Cod Wars have been almost completely erased from history, and the reality of a country facing a reduced geopolitical status, not least relative to the USA, ignored. (24/x)
To conclude the thread, here’s an excerpt from the song “Three Score And Ten”, performed by the Watersons. It was written to commemorate a disaster in the late 19th century that claimed the lives of many fishermen working in the North Sea. (25/x)
We will not honour the people who worked in the fishing industry or regenerate coastal communities by rewriting our history and deluding ourselves about our present. (26/26)
