French fishermen should be able to return quickly to the waters of the Channel Island of Guernsey. "I think by the end of the week (February 3-9), if we work as we said, things will get back to normal "Amélie de Montchalin, the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, told AFP on the sidelines of a visit to a fishmonger's business near Caen on Tuesday (February 4th). A few hours later, during the questions to government session, the Minister of Agriculture, Didier Guillaume, was also reassuring: “The solution has been found. "
Since Saturday 1st February, the day Brexit entered into force, French fishermen no longer had fishing rights in the so-called "6-12 mile" area around the Channel Islands of Guernsey, Sark and Alderney. These fish-rich waters are found off the coast of the Cotentin peninsula (Manche).
The ban concerns around a hundred Breton boats and around fifty Norman sailors, mainly deep-sea trawlers and coarse fishers. According to estimates by the Normandy Regional Fisheries Committee, 500 tonnes of fish and crustaceans are caught per year by the Normans in these waters of the bailiwick of Guernsey.
"We took a big morale hit"
" This Wednesday (5 February), the weather is good, I had to go there to fish for conger eel, fox, shark-ha, emissole … Patatras!, testifies Cédric Delacour, boss of Manola, located at the small port of Omonville-la-Rogue, in La Hague. I carry out more than a third of my activity in this area. Others are more. We are not going to make a mess, but if a Guernsey fishing boat points its nose at Diélette, we block it. "
"Overnight, Brexit became concrete", says another fisherman patron, fierce supporter, too, "To ban all fish from Guernsey, Cherbourg or other Norman ports". In the Cherbourg-en-Cotentin auction, “Guernsey fishermen land an annual average of 133 tonnes, mainly crustaceans and skate. Other sales are made directly with the wholesalers ", specifies Séverine Jean, director of the tidal center of Cherbourg-en-Cotentin.
"We took a big morale hit, says Dimitri Rogoff, President of the Normandy Regional Fisheries Committee. This affair is also the fault of the State, which was unable to be strong enough and to negotiate against the small bailiwick of Guernsey. It’s symbolic. I do not want this to be a bad omen. "
