Hastings: The Shingle Fleet

Helen Mark visits the ancient town of Hastings to meet the people involved in the fishing community there. The fishing fleet is made up of small wooden boats which are all under ten metres long. This is important as, unusually, they are launched each day from the beach. This involves pushing them down the shingle bank, by tractor nowadays but traditionally by hand, and winching them back up again out of the sea when they return. Helen meets Paul Joy, a fisherman, who can date his family back as far as the 1000s, all launching their boats from the beach in Hastings as he does today. This is true of lots of the fishing families working there. But even with such a long and thriving history behind them the Hastings fishing industry is now in trouble. Their crews are in their seventies and there's no sign of new blood, and their wages are falling. Before 2006, under ten metre boats weren't subject to any EU fishing quotas as they were deemed exempt, but new legislation brought in six years ago changed all this. Since then the number of cod they're allowed to catch has dramatically reduced, and the fishermen are struggling.Producer: Beatrice Fenton.