Reality of Brexit deal hitting fishermen in UK and France says expert

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Last month the French were left furious after the UK Government approved just 12 of the 47 fishing licence applications it had received from French small boats. Just days later, the Jersey Government said it had rejected 75 of the 170 licence applications it had received from French vessels. French Foreign Affairs Minister Clement Beaune has warned EU member states are preparing to announce measures to force the UK to abide by the terms of the Brexit deal.

He didn’t provide detail on what those measures might entail but noted Britain depends on energy supplies it receives from Europe – hinting at a possible electricity blackout.

The latest furious row has also seen French fishing industry representatives threaten to block the port of Calais and stop exports to the UK in the run-up to Christmas.

But a leading Frexiteer has claimed Brexit Britain is right to restrict access to its waters by French fishermen, adding it is a “protectionist position that makes sense”.

Eric Noirez from the Generation Frexit campaign group also lashed out at the threats from Mr Beaune, raging it is a “terrible admission of impotence for the Europeanist camp”.

He told Express.co.uk: “If we are honest, we must admit that Great Britain is perfectly within its rights when it decides to restrict access to its waters to French fishermen in order to favour its own fishermen.

“It is a protectionist position that makes sense.

“Of course, it is unfortunate for French fishermen, but what Clément Beaune does not say is that within the EU, French fishermen remain subject to ultra-competition with other fishermen and cannot benefit from protectionist measures, since the EU prohibits this.

“It is because of the EU that French fishermen are disadvantaged.

“Clément Beaune’s threats, beyond being undignified and worrying, are in fact a terrible admission of impotence for the Europeanist camp.

“In reality, the sooner France frees itself from the European Union, the sooner it will be able to re-establish healthy relations with its British neighbour, relations such as they were before the European Union existed.”

In a further attack against Mr Beaune, the leading Frexiteer accused France’s Foreign Affairs Minister of being “blinded by his Eurofanaticism” as he cannot see it is in fact the EU who are to blame for the French fishing crisis.

He warned “France is the big loser in the story” and that it was actually “European bureaucracy that negotiated the post-Brexit fisheries agreement”.

Mr Noirez said: “As always, Clément Beaune is blinded by his Eurofanaticism: like the dishonest ideologue that he is, he refuses to see in this matter of fishermen’s access to British waters that the dysfunction comes from the European Union.

“It was the European bureaucracy that negotiated the post-Brexit fisheries agreements and the problem is that where the UK now decides for and on its behalf, France is still dependent on the negotiations established by Brussels, which claims to be able to defend the divergent interests of 27 different nations in a single policy, in a single diplomatic block.

“And, unsurprisingly, once again, it does not work: France is the big loser in the story and French fishermen are the victims of the stubbornness of French leaders who want Brussels to decide for France.”

He also ramped up Frexit calls by insisting France could forge its own fishing deal with the UK and enjoy a much healthier relationship outside the EU.

Mr Noirez concluded: “It is obvious that a classic nation-to-nation negotiation, a direct Franco-British negotiation, would have been more productive for both countries.

“I would ask the question: without the EU, would the trade relationship between France and the UK be as problematic? Without the EU, would there have been such an overbidding, with threats of energy embargoes like those made by Clément Beaune?

“Brexit is a good thing: in fact, Clément Beaune would like to make the British pay for the dysfunctions and nuisances that the EU causes for France.

“He refuses to see that what is wrong with France is the EU. Not Brexit.

“But what Clément Beaune and the Europeanists also refuse to admit is that with Brexit the UK has made the choice of independence and a return to full sovereignty: a nation that makes decisions in the interests of the British people.

“Yet the British people were clear in their vote on June 23, 2016: they no longer want European rules, they want to restore their own rules, and among their rules is the return of control over British fisheries and waters.

“A democratic legitimacy that people like Clément Beaune stubbornly refuse to accept, just as they do not accept the idea that today the European continent is not one big market where everyone can come and help themselves.”

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