Fresh fish to your door - Don't let COVID19 stop the guys fishing - buy online or from a supplier near you!

Two days ago, the local netter Stelissa skippered by Ryan Davey decided to take a chance and head out through the gaps...

and commit him, his crew and the boat to a full hake trip south of Ireland...

with a full twenty hour trip ahead of them they steamed west-north-west into the setting sun over the Scillys...

before arriving on the fishing grounds yesterday to shoot their nets...

here's them picking out the fish as they haul...

looks like they're having some for tea!..

in these challenging times the UK public can do their bit to a) eat a healthy diet and b) help keep the nation's fishermen at sea buy buying fresh fish either online or from a supplier in your area.

Not sure where to start?..

well, the oldest trade guild in the UK, the London based Fishmongers Company has teamed up with Fish for Thought with a fantastic map based suppliers list...

which - and suppliers are now being added constantly - will help put you in touch with a suitable source of fresh fish - either bought locally from a fish shop, mobile delivery van or by courier - straight to your door - in some cases you can get a delivery from the fisherman himself or herself!..

which is how this fabulous collection of fresh Newlyn fish...

found its way...

to one lucky recipient who ordered her 'catch of the day' online from Fresh Cornish Fish...



Don't forget Cornwall is absolutely spoilt for choice when it comes to fresh fish and the sheer variety of species and it has it's very own Good Seafood Guide - there's recipe ideas, fishermen's tales, where to buy and much more all available at the click of a mouse!

Anyone with any further ideas, thoughts or wanting to add their name and fish supply details - be it a small single-handed fishing boat to a fish shop, fish merchant or anyone able to help increase transport between the boats landing fish and distribution points the pleased drop Gavin a line at Fishmongers or contact Through the Gaps.

NFFO pressing the government for bespoke fishing support package.

The immediate issue confronting the fishing industry, as the covid-19 virus crisis takes grip of the economy, are the gaps in the otherwise very significant financial support measures announced by the Government.

The fishing sector has its unique contours, which means that generalised support measures only fit where they touch.

Grants that are available to businesses closed down in hospitality sector, do not extend to the boats that are equally affected downstream, as markets for fish and shellfish disappear

Many self-employed share fishermen will be supported by the measures announced for the self-employed, but a considerable number at the bottom and top of the range will lose out because of the way that their past earnings have been recorded – and July, when the funds become available, is a long way away

There is a desperate need for clear guidance and support in making applications

COVID 19 – UK GOVERNMENT PROPOSALS

• CJRS (Coronavirus Job Retention scheme)

• 80% wage paid to furlough workers up to value of £2,500 p.m. until end May, possibly longer.

• Covid 19 Corporate Finance facility

• Designed to provide financial assistance on short term liabilities for large companies.

• Assistance for Self Employed

• Provides 80% of average salary up to £2.5kpm for Tax registered self-employed. Payments unlikely before June.

• Coronavirus Business Interruption loan scheme

• Designed to provide access to bank loans, Government underwriting 80% . Available to small and medium size businesses only.

• UK Export Finance (UKEF)

• Tools include Export Working Capital Scheme, Export Insurance and Direct Lending Facility.

• £20bn Government grants

• Grants restricted to SMEs and to larger companies in most vulnerable sectors (hospitality, retail and leisure).

• 1 year 100% rate relief

• Applies only to hospitality, retail and leisure properties.

• HMRC -time to pay scheme

• Allows deferment of tax payments. Agreed on case by case basis.

• Bank of England reduced interest rate

• Bank rate now set at 0.1%

• Potential to reduce interest on liabilities.

• Vat deferral from 20 March to 30 June 2020

• Business will not be required to make VAT payments during this period.

• Extension of time to file reports

• 3 month extension to deadline for filing of company reports.

• 3-month Mortgage/ Rent holiday, including commercial properties

• Temporary benefit to workers/companies.

• Classification of food sector workers as “key” sector

• Key workers school aged children will have continued access to schools.

• Statutory Sick Pay relief allowing SMEs to reclaim sick pay payments to staff

• Applicable only to SMEs.

• Increase in Working Tax Credit allowance

• Workers currently able to claim working tax credit will see weekly increase of around £20 per week.

Fishing Businesses

But the biggest and most obvious gap in support is for fishing businesses of all sizes who face ongoing costs – harbour dues, insurance costs, equipment rentals etc. with no, or dramatically reduced earnings to cover them. There is a real risk of business failure, threatening the aim of keeping fishing businesses intact, so that they can recover and rebuild when this crisis is over.

In our twice weekly (online) meetings with Defra ministers and officials, the NFFO has been pressing the case for a bespoke scheme to fill this gap. It is our understanding that work is under way on the design of a support package by weighing options for different types of scheme and assessing where other support measures fall short. Treasury approval will be required but the Chancellor’s commitment to do what it takes, gives hope that support for what is regarded as a unique and iconic sector will be forthcoming.

We have argued for a twin track approach:

Tie-up aid for those vessels where their markets have completely disappeared, or where continuing to operate wouldn’t cover costs
Top-up aid, for those vessels where there is a continuing, albeit depleted, market to ensure that operations and supply chains can continue
The UK has left the EU but has paid into the EU budgets for 2020 and is subject to all EU rules until the end of December. Close attention is being payed, therefore, to moves in Brussels to change the state aid rules to allow temporary cessation aid in the current extreme circumstances.

Regulatory Easement and Other Support Measures

Towards the end of last week Defra circulated a long list of potential additional measures which had been suggested to the department. These ranged from the vital, relevant and workable to the opportunistic and potentially harmful. Over two conference calls involving NFFO representatives from all sectors and parts of the coast, and numerous emails across the weekend, the Federation put together a response which separated the wheat from the chaff and was submitted to Defra by the deadline on Monday.

Above all, the Federation argued for a robust procedure to ensure that those measure adopted are the ones that do good, rather than harm. A simple filter is required to quickly but thoroughly assess each proposal:

1. Is the measure justified by evidence and proportionate?

2. What would the effects be, including effects on markets?

3. Who would be positively and negatively affected?

4. Will the medium and longer-term impacts outweigh any short-term benefits?

Summary

As the current health emergency continues, the NFFO along with other representative bodies in the industry, are pressing for an aid package that would fill the gaps in the Government’s current support measures. The most obvious of these is support for fishing businesses to allow then to recover when markets recovers. A list of other “regulatory easement” measures is being assessed to identify those that would provide maximum benefit.

See the NFFO for updates:

Newlyn Fish Box Museum.

While many people have time on their hands, Newlyn Harbourmaster, Rob Parsons is currently looking for both fish merchants and fishermen to help add to the harbour's growing collection of unusual fish boxes. In particular, he is after early wooden and cardboard examples as these seem to be in very short supply. 

Donated boxes should be left by the harbour office with a label indicating an intention for the box(es) to be added to the museum collection.

A full list of existing box types and names will be available shortly.

~Coronavirus: UK fishing industry ‘will go bust’ in weeks without urgent intervention~

Coronavirus could see hundreds of fishermen "go bust in the next two weeks" unless there is urgent government intervention, minsters have been warned.

Coronavirus could see hundreds of fishermen “go bust in the next two weeks” unless there is urgent government intervention, minsters have been warned.
The industry has been rocked in recent days as demand from export markets and the domestic restaurant trade has dried up due to the outbreak.

Labour’s shadow environment minister Ruth Jones, speaking in the Commons, warned without government help the whole sector could be in danger. She said: “I have spoken to fishers and their representative organisations right across the UK in recent days and they are worried. In just the last week the market value of fish landed by British fishers has fallen in value to 20% of normal rates. There are significant concerns about the viability of the UK fishing industry, especially small boats, which are the backbone of the British fleet. Many fishers are telling us they will go bust in the next two weeks. Does the Secretary of State agree with me that we must take whatever steps necessary to support fishers and the fishing industry to cope with the pressures of the Covid-19 crisis.”

Environment Secretary George Eustice said the best way to help fishermen was to “get the markets moving again”.

He added: “Officials had meetings yesterday with fishing representatives, I’m looking for some feedback from that to agree what we will do next.”

Mr Eustice later faced questions over the resilience of the supply chain, given the scenes in supermarkets in recent days.

He said: “There isn’t a shortage of food, the challenge that we’ve had is getting food to shelves in time when people have been purchasing more.

“That’s why we have taken steps including setting aside delivery curfews so that lorries can run around the clock, relaxing driver hours to ensure the deliveries can take place more frequently and we are in discussions with other Government colleagues in MHCLG around other support that we would deliver locally to get food to those who are self isolating.”

Mr Eustice also ruled out enforcing social distancing measures in supermarkets.

“We will not do that measure”, he said.

“It was something that was done in Italy, with a restriction on the number of people in stores and what they found was they just had hundreds of people huddled together at the entrance to the store and it’s counterproductive.”

Full story courtesy of Press and Journal by Daniel O'Donoghue

The fleet fishes on during COVID19

Despite a huge drop in fish prices as the country struggles to maintain supply chains for fresh fish many of the bigger vessels in the fleet are fishing on hoping that prices will be sufficient to make each trip viable for the boat and the crew. Crystal Sea is landing off the end of the Mary Williams pier followed by skipper Ryan Davey taking the Stelissa to sea - a 20 hour steam ahead of them to the fishing grounds is a big enough commitment in itself.

Financial support package for fishermen and fishworkers.

It is widely acknowledged that the UK Government’s package of financial support to mitigate the economic impacts of the coronavirus health emergency, is unprecedented outside wartime. The immediate task is to assess how good a fit those support packages are for the fishing industry, which is in many ways unique as an economic sector, and to identify any gaps which require additional attention. Government and industry are dealing with a dynamic and fluid situation under extreme time pressures.

Business Support and Support for Wage Earners

Although extremely welcome in many businesses, including some in the fishing sector, the Government’s package of grants, loans and support for workers who are on the PAYE system, is of limited relevance to the many fishermen who are self-employed share fishers, with no guaranteed wage, but reliant instead on a share of the earnings of each trip.

That is why the industry waited anxiously on Thursday evening (26th March) for the Chancellor’s announcement of financial support measures for the self-employed.

Package for the Self-Employed

• The self-employed will be able to apply for a taxable grant worth 80% of their average monthly profits over the last 3 years, up to £2500 a month.
• This scheme will be open for three months but can be extended “if necessary”.
• The scheme will be open to anyone with trading profits up to £50,000, available to anyone who makes the majority of their income from self-employment, and only open to people with a self-assessment tax return in 2019.
• The scheme will be up and running by the beginning of June. The Government will look to get it set up faster but cannot make any promises.
• To make sure no one misses out, the Government has decided to allow anyone who missed the filling deadline in January, four weeks from today to submit their tax return.
• The first payment will come in June, but the payment will be backdated to capture payments for March, April and May. To assist people with the late payment, the Government also said that income tax payments due in July can also be deferred to the end of January 2021
• Unlike the employee scheme, the self-employed can continue to work as they receive support.

Our first impression is that the furlough arrangements for waged employees, and parallel support for the self-employed have together the capacity to bring relief to many working in the sector, including many self-employed share- fishermen. June is however a long time to wait and there will certainly be cases of hardship. There will be some, possibly many, who fall through the gaps at the bottom and the top because of the way past earnings have been recorded. Universal credit is the only safety net for these fishermen.

The urgency with which these packages have been constructed mean that detailed guidance is not yet available and there will be many who remain unclear about their individual situations. Providing that guidance and dealing with anomalies and confusions is a priority.

Fishing Businesses

The one remaining, very visible, gap in the Government’s support package is for the many vessel operators who have continuing fixed costs during the health emergency but have seen their earnings collapse completely or considerably as demand has fallen away.

Support is urgently required for these businesses, who have seen their markets dramatically contract, or disappear completely, as restaurants, fish and chip shops, supermarket counters have closed, and many export markets have faced difficulties.

The Government has provided grants of £10,000 to £25,000 to business affected by enforced closures in the hospitality and restaurant sector. In many cases this is the market supplied by fishing vessels who are equally impacted but do not receive the assistance provided for the customer facing part of the trade.

We believe that the Government shares the industry’s goal of keeping fishing businesses and the entire supply chain intact, so that they can recover rapidly once the health measures and movement restrictions can be relaxed. To achieve this, direct support for fishing vessels who face harbour dues, equipment rentals, etc. will be essential.

There are different ways to deliver this support and we understand that conversations are underway within government. Clearly Treasury approval will be required.

We believe that the Chancellor understands that fishing is a unique sector, which often does not fit the standard models of economic activity. The Government also understands very well that fishing is a totemic sector.

Where markets have not completely collapsed, vessels and supply chains should be supported to maintain operation to contribute to the food security of the nation. This will only be possible if earnings are at a level that can cover costs. Where markets have dried completely, vessels must be supported to cover ongoing business costs so that they are in a fit state to start fishing and trading when recovery arrives.


Full story courtesy of the NFFO - 30TH MARCH 2020 IN DOMESTIC FISHERIES POLICY

Coronavirus update from Seafish.

Marcus Coleman, CEO, Seafish gives an update to the UK seafood industry on what help and support there is during the COVID-19 infection. 

For further information visit www.seafish.org