Great Britain Economic Condition of Fishermen. 59 



The fishing industry is allied to agriculture in so far as it is directed to gathering the 

 spontaneous products of nature and placing it within reach of consumption and commerce. 

 But it is also a manufacturing industry in all that regards drying, salting, curing, kippering, 

 smoking, &c., and thereby subject to the factory laws. There is a wide difference in the 

 condition of the industry between river fisheries and deep-sea fisheries, such as the herring, 

 the cod, the pilchard, the whale, the oyster, and many others. In all cases, however, the 

 fishing industry is fitful and irregular in times and seasons, and subject to great alternations 

 of pressure, with long intervals of idleness, a circumstance which deeply affects the economic 

 condition of the workers. In some localities the fisherfolk follow the fish ; when the fishing 

 is ended in one locality, they proceed to another. In other localities the fisherfolk alternate 

 fishing and agricultural labour ; and in others, when fishing is ended, the fishermen engage 

 as sailors. But in all cases the occupation is of a most intermittent character, inconsistent 

 with persistent labour, and well fitted to encourage lassitude and laziness. The fishing 

 population can scarcely be said to belong to the towns, though affected by many of the 

 conditions of town life. All along the coast-line of the British Isles and other countries, yet 

 centred in fishing ports of greater or less importance, there they live, a hardy, adventurous 

 race, ready, at all hazards, to gather the inexhaustible spoils of the sea. 



In several respects the fisherman's lot is worse than that of the agricultural labourer. It 

 was stated in the Report of the Royal Commissioners on Sea Fisheries, that whilst, once 

 in the year, an acre of good land, carefully tilled, produces a ton of corn, or two or three cwts. 

 of meat or cheese, the same area at the bottom of the sea on the best fishing ground may 

 yield a greater weight of food to the persevering fisherman every week in the year. Yet the 

 result to those immediately interested are widely different. Thero are in the United Kingdom 

 about 120,000 persons constantly, or occasionally, employed in fishing, who with their 

 dependants may be taken at 400,000, and the total annual value of the British fisheries is 

 stated to be over eleven million pounds sterling, giving an average produce of about 27 per 

 head, whilst about 3,300,000 persons employed in agriculture raise annually produce to the 

 extent of about 270,000,000, giving an average of about 82 per head. Accordingly the 

 portion falling to the immediate workers respectively are very different. Whilst of the 

 11,000,000 produced by the fisheries scarcely thirty per cent., or 3,000,000 go to the pockets 

 of the fishermen, of the 270,000,000, the total produce of land, at least 25 per cent., or 

 about 70,000,000, are spent in wages, giving in the case of the fishermen about 10 per head, 

 exclusive of incomes from other occupations, and in the case of the agriculturist about 

 21 per head a year, or, taking two earners per family, less than 6. a week for the fisherman, 

 and about 16s. a week for the agriculturist. Follow, moreover, a fisherman family and a 

 family of the agricultural labourer in their homes. The fisherman's family have to pay 10 

 to 12 a year for house rent, the agriculturist 2 to 4 per annum. The agriculturist family 

 has vegetables in abundance always at hand, the fisherman's must purchase everything. 



But how is it that the fisherman gets comparatively so little of the produce of his labour ? 

 Can any economy be effected in the disposal of the fish ? Would not the contract of wages, 

 which would leave the master free to economise the produce, prove more advantageous than 

 the present system ? Or would not a contract of partnership between the owners and the 

 fishermen, in the shape of the Commandite principle, answer the purpose better still? What 

 can be done to render the industry more productive and more profitable ? Could not steam 

 power be introduced in British fishing vessels as the French have introduced in theirs? Are 

 not the boats used too small in most cases ? Are the gear and nets all that can be desired ? 

 And what can be done to introduce more safety to life and ' property ? Can the electric 

 telegraph be better utilized for the announcement to fishing vessels already at sea of 

 threatening storms ? Is there not great need of larger and more frequent harbours of refuge 

 all along the coasts? Are the boats and gear sufficiently insured, or can any system of 

 mutual insurance be safely introduced? Is life insurance sufficiently appreciated by our 

 fishermen ? Exposed to constant danger, do they take advantage of that beneficial system to 

 provide that in case of loss of life their friends and relations shall not be left altogether 

 forlorn ? The Post Office Savings Banks are extensively diffused. Do they enter all the nooks 

 and corners of the coast, so as to encourage thrift and self-reliance among all connected with 

 the fisheries? These are the questions which determine the economic condition of our 

 fishermen. 



