A GUERNSEY fisherman is missing more than £6,000-worth of gear. New Fishermen’s Association president Peter Munro said that it was destroyed by a French trawler overnight on Sunday-Monday.

His pots were laid in mid-Channel, about 30 miles north-west of the island.

‘We turned up on Monday and there was one trawler working amongst our gear and we have suffered heavy losses,’ he said.

‘We caught him with gear. There are incidents all the time, but this is worse than normal.

‘It’s like a kick in the stomach,’ he said. ‘This is the worst incident for two years.’

He met the skipper and the authorities in Cherbourg yesterday to look into recouping his losses.

‘The skipper came aboard and apologised while we were loading, along with French officials.

‘We then went aboard his boat, Sarah P, to look at his tows from where he went through the gear.

‘It appears it’s a new skipper and new boat and it’s his first two weeks fishing in this area. The authorities have asked me to keep in touch if I find any of the gear but I am not hopeful for compensation.

‘It’s potentially a loss of 87 pots,’ said Mr Munro.

The pots cost about £70 each while the value of the catch – of crab and lobster – is unknown.

Mr Munro praised the Guernsey authorities.

‘They had satellite tracking on the boat after the incident and they have put a report in to the French authorities and to Defra,’ said Mr Munro.

His six-strong crew is particularly annoyed as the incident occurred in a recognised fishing area.

‘You spend days at meetings with the French, Belgian and Brixham fishermen discussing coexistence of grounds and we work recognised areas,’ said Mr Munro.

‘It’s particularly annoying because the Cherbourg authorities had an annual fishing conference earlier this year and it was a Cherbourg boat involved.

‘I’m waiting to speak to the skipper but he is telling the authorities he did not know the gear was there, which we find hard to believe.

‘You always get a few problems, but this is quite a severe problem – it affects the earnings of the crew and the boat,’ said Mr Munro.

Previous incidents have usually involved French boats.

‘We believe he [the French skipper] had no regard for any other gear in the area. He was pushing English angling boats out of the way while he was fishing.

‘We would like to see this sort of act open to prosecution.

‘In recent months we have had a good working relationship with the French and hopefully this is an isolated incident,’ he said.

‘We are hoping the French authorities will honour the good relationship we have had and will deal with this incident.

‘It’s a loss of fishing time. We might never find the pots again – they have to be ordered and made and it could take a month to receive new ones from the UK.’

Senior sea fisheries officer John Torode said: ‘The potting zones were created about 25 years ago for trawlers and potters to work the grounds together.

‘It’s a fishermen’s agreement and is not based in law; it’s the will of the fishermen whether it’s going to work or not. We hope they can continue to work together to make the agreements succeed.

‘Hopefully this will be a one-off incident,’ he said.

‘Hopefully Peter will be able to receive his pots back or get some compensation from the fisherman concerned. I believe that [French] boat has only recently started working out of Cherbourg and this may be part of the problem.’