Jack the Rippon
Sir: Under the Wilson government the voice of Wales was clamant, and WelShmen were in seats of power and influence. Under the Heath regime the voice of Wales has been reduced to a whisper breathed reluctantly by politicians whose political anchorage lies outside the Principality. Where thy Treasure lies, there shall we find thy heart! Hence a land crisscrossed by mountain barriers has been lumped in with lowland England in the proposed local government changes.
Now Jack the Rippon has come back with what he calls a Fisheries Agreement and a 'settlement.' This is not a sell-out! In every sale there is an exchange and a consideration. But there is no reward for Britain in this shameful betrayal. We just get the privilege of paying over between £500 and £1,200 million per annum of taxpayers' money to backward Continental farmers and perhaps fishermen! It is not a sale or a settlement; it is a sacrifice! Our fishermen are being sacrificed on the altar of the golden calf of the City of London.
Opponents have rightly concentrated on the uncertainty of the future of our fishing interests after ten years. Yet Heath must be aware that it is .uncertainty Which is choking back investment in our whole economy. But these is something more urgent to notice. While the north-east coast from the Orkneys down to Flamborough Head gets a twelve mile screen for a ten year period, almost the whole of the rest of the coastline of England, Scotland and Wales is protected only by a six mile screen — with a very dubious future after ten years. The exception is the Cornish peninsula, which France is matching with special protection for her Breton and Norman coasts. The Heath policy seems to be AntiViking and Anti-Norman in the north-east and south-west. The rest of the country can go to hell! There will be no protection for the fishers of Lancaster or Cumbria or Cambria or the Inner or Outer Hebrides, or the West Scots coast. Welshmen will not fail to notice not only that there is no protection for a single mile of this ancient kingdom's coastline, but that there does not seem to have been any intention or desire that there should be any such protection. It will not be lost on the rising generation in Wales, many already voicing Nationalist emotions, that the independent kingdom of Eire has achieved almost total twelve mile protection for her coastline. Yet just over the border the fishers of Londonderry, Lough Foyle and Portrush will have no special protection. A fine Tory ploy to keep Londonderry loyal! And as for Wales: not a single mile!
But it does not end there! The south coast of the Bristol Channel is protected; but not the Welsh coast. Eire is protected but hardly any of Ulster. The north-east is protected; but not the Wash and East Anglia! What will happen? Clearly the full brunt of the Continental invaders will fall on the unscreened coasts, where they can come six miles closer in with impunity. We must assume that the coasts not given special protection are the least fertile and productive. It is there that the attacks will come in! The results must be obvious: overfishing on poor grounds. For the local fishers the outlook is grim, and in areas desperate for employment!
There is an air of fat and futile innocence about this Jack the Rippon of ours! Can one discern any rational purpose behind the Tory attitude to our fisheries? One unifying principle may seem to many to explain in part their outlook. Where the Tory party has much to lose and perhaps something to gain, there is a twelve mile screen; where it has little to lose and nothing to gain, there is no protection. This comes out most blatantly in the cases of Wales and Ulster. It seems that the Tory party under Heath is no longer the party of national interest but a party of factional gain!
It is only some years ago that our eighteenth century Foreign Office was persuaded to extend our coastal limits beyond three miles. Now we are taking a fateful step backwards! Up till now our coastal protection vessels and the Admiralty needed, with minor exceptions, to ask themselves only one question: Ours or outsiders? Now they will have to ask "which outsiders?" Rank outsiders — or licensed and privileged outsiders? Their burden will be trebled! The task of countering the blackslave traffickers will be immensely more difficult as well!
This is not policy; it is the abnegation of policy! But after all is not 'abdication from policy' the hallmark af the Health regime? J. L. Owen Dolgoed, Bala, Wales
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