rag worm

Member Joined: Jul 01, 2007 Posts: 10 Location: Cornwall

Hi new to site and looking for help/advice allready,living and fishing in Cornwall ,unfortunately finances a bit tight price of rag worm more than i can afford,could anyone please advise me of places to dig my own,anywhere in cornwall considered.
many thanks shoreman

Guest

torpoint at low tide mate is the best place i know but be careful coz u aint really allowed.... big grin

Member Joined: May 06, 2006 Posts: 97

yiddal72 wrote:

torpoint at low tide mate is the best place i know but be careful coz u aint really allowed.... big grin

Why are you not really allowed to dig?

Member Joined: Jul 01, 2007 Posts: 10 Location: Cornwall

yiddal72 wrote:

torpoint at low tide mate is the best place i know but be careful coz u aint really allowed.... big grin

Thanks for reply m8 much appreciated,same question as jb though,how come we're not allowed,just so i can prepare any answers if im asked what im doing there.

Posted: Sat Jul 07, 2007 12:16 pm

There have already been several legal test cases on this, as some of us know and basically they can't stop you taking anything off the foreshore which is intended for fishing purposes. If anyone tries to stop you, tell them to p**s off.

Guest

eccles wrote:

There have already been several legal test cases on this, as some of us know and basically they can't stop you taking anything off the foreshore which is intended for fishing purposes. If anyone tries to stop you, tell them to p**s off.

politely of course

Guest

but doesnt it depend on who owns/leases the foreshore?

bb

Guest

blueboar wrote:

but doesnt it depend on who owns/leases the foreshore?

bb

Certainly does......and the law is not as clear as some might have us think. Also some of the "old law" that people rely on for fishing and digging rights has been overtaken by recent legislation such as the Wildlife and Countryside Act.

Normally, one is fairly safe if the foreshore is public and there is a public right of way to get to it......but a right to dig is still not 100% guaranteed. Typical case in point locally to me is Hutleys Beach at St Osyth, where the beach is privately owned and digging is not allowed, although there is public access.

Also beware if you are told that you can always dig below the mean low water mark, even if the foreshore is privately owned....it's not neccesarily the case and there have been a couple of cases where that argument has been lost. We may use acient rights to fish and dig but there are also a lot of ancient rights to ownership of the foreshore also....and even if you firmly believe you are in the right to dig, if someone takes you to court it will cost you a fortune to defend yourself....so tread carefully.

Incidentially, if someone does try to stop you and you are entitled to dig, rather than telling them to p*@s off, try explaining politely that you are entitled to dig and that as an angler, you don't want the foreshore destroyed and ruined any more than the naturalists....that generally gets a better reaction than an insult!

Guest

Essentially, I agree with Blakdogs comments on this.

For those who may not have heard it before, here's a brief recap of the arguments:

1. Magna Carta was signed by the Crown and is still in force as our unofficial constitution.
2. Magna Carta lays out certain fundamental rights to the common man.
3. In this case, the section which applies is that which gives every man the right to fish from the shore and engage in activities ancilliary to the act of fishing (eg. Bait Gathering/Digging)
4. Other than a few 'Privately Owned' beaches, all beaches are Crown property which have effectively been 'leased' to councils in order that they may be maintained.
5. Some councils have instigated a license system for digging bait to 'ensure public safety' from big holes etc. and enshrined this as a by-law.
6.Southend Council in a test case were found against and the court ruled that licenses for the purpose of bait digging could not be legally enforced as the council has no right to create a by-law which contravenes the basis tenets of Magna Carta.
7. Southend Council have appealed.
8. The fact remains in law that no Council may instigate a by-law which contravenes Magna Carta.
9. Many councils still do (and not just for fishing/bait gathering) but the average individual does not have sufficient financial resourses to fight against a cause that even the courts have not yet fully ruled on.
10. If a digging license is required for your area, it's probably worth getting as they're only cheap and will save a lot of aggro.
11. Remember, if you are told that digging is prohibited on a particular beach, there MUST be suitable and sufficient signage displayed prominently which clearly states that this is the case. If there is not, they cannot stop you unless you are also doing something else contrary to the by-laws in force at that time. SAYING DIGGING IS BANNED IS NOT ENOUGH!

There, hope that helps. :lol:

Guest

But concerning the foreshore, the people Who have the right are fishermen ( not beach anglers) but the fishermen who haul their boats out on the beach like up at Aldeburgh, Dunwich and Dungness and for navigation reasons, ie: if a boat gets into trouble it then has the right to land on the foreshore.

The crown permitts you to walk on her land, but legally you don't have the right, but if the foreshore is leased by an organisation they have the right to stop bait digging??? Don't they?

But surely if the beach was part of a conservation area and protected under SAC,SPA, SSSI etc and people knew that, then surely thats enough.. for not needing signs

Guest

This is the problem Blueboar. It's not really been an issue until relatively recently. As a consequence, the Law Lords have not ruled on which act/acts take precedence. As it stands, the High Court has ruled unequivocally that the 'Right to Fish and acts ancilliary to' are inviolable pending any further ruling. Recently, Essex and Kent Fisheries tried to get bait digging of any sort on any Essex and Kent beaches banned completely. There was a huge outcry, Magna Carta was invoked and they backed down. That action from a government body would indicate that there may be something in it.

As for the right to fish from the foreshore, that is a moot point. Magna Carta only say the right to fish-it is not specific. Also remember, at the time it was written, many commoners trapped fish in baskets which were placed at low tide. It's fishing, but not from a boat.

In the meantime however, I guess that Fully 'Private' beaches can enforce access issues through the trespass and criminal damage laws but, this then raises the question that if Crown property has fallen to civil ownership (ie Government sponsored) and the government represents the people then strictly speaking, all beaches are owned by the people. This would then raise the question over whether the Government had any right to sell off these beaches without public authority to do so.

Ok, I'm being Devils Advocate here but it's an interesting point.

As for baitdigging, I still maintain, as Blakdog does, that it is worth doing your homework first.

Guest

Sorry, to answer the final point about signs, essentially you are right. Certain places that have been designated for sound reasons should not need to place signs. I suspect that most baitdiggers would shy away from those areas as well as it's not in their interests to be seen to be damaging a special area.

However, the fact remains that on the majority of public beaches in this country, if digging is banned, the local councils have a legal obligation to ensure that this ban is properly advertised.

Guest

What I thought was strange were the rules regarding SSSI areas. They introduced one locally on the Colne some time ago and as the Secretary of the local club I got involved re rights to fish and dig. The people I dealt with (and I can't remember exactly what office it was, DOE I think) were very clear that in introducing the site, so long as these activities were not breaking the law and had been carried out traditionally, they had no legal right to hinder them without a court judgement.

Permission had to be granted by the powers that be to carry out those activities within the SSSI, but the responsibility to apply for permission was with the landowner.....if they didn't and you were caught digging or fishing....it was the landowner who got prosecuted....not you. In our case the local Council and the NRA owned most of the land and had to apply for that permission......otherwise they could have faced prosecution regarding the SSSI rules and a private case from the anglers for not ensuring that our legal rights were protected. That was how I understood it anyway....took months to get it sorted!!!!!!!

Guest

There you go! So there's a simple basic premise and as usual, the political tribes go off half cocked and complicate the hell out of it! What a bloody palava! :lol:

Guest

DuncBooth5 wrote:

There you go! So there's a simple basic premise and as usual, the political tribes go off half cocked and complicate the hell out of it! What a bloody palava! :lol:

Your not kidding!!!!! It was getting the council to write a letter that took the time.

I'm all for this SSSI thing, its one of the things that has kept this river protected and some of my favourite marks reletively unspoilt.......but I wish they'd make it a bit easier to administer.

Incidentially the bit about signs is pretty simple.

Most of the digging bans are brought in by councils under what is termed "Deligated Legislation"....that is where a statute is available to various local authorities that can invoke parts of that statute (under certain conditions and according to a set of rules for doing so) as and when they feel the need dictates.

The statute requires them to provide signs or certain types of notification so that people are aware that, for instance, a bait digging ban in place. Seems reasonable to me. A similar situation is the local speed limits on our roads.......as long as the council follows the laid down procedure and the signs are right, its legal.

Thats not to say that it can't be challenged in court though, cos it can.

Feel free to tidy this up Dunc ....... two years at night school did not a lawyer make :lol: