THE INSHORE FISHERIES i8i 



suggested " that the protection of our sea fisheries being a question 

 closely affecting the United Kingdom generally, and not merely 

 the counties and boroughs abutting on the sea, the expense of such 

 protection should be defrayed by the Imperial Exchequer, and not 

 by local sources." The attention of the Central Department has 

 been drawn to this question practically every year since. As long 

 ago as 1896 the clerk to the Western Committee stated " that so 

 long as the individual county councils of the several districts have 

 to bear the whole expenses for the maintenance of the staff and all 

 the work, that the work cannot be efficiently done." 



At first the Central Department were quite firm on this point, 

 no financial assistance could be anticipated from the Imperial 

 purse. But of late years, with the general development of grants in 

 aid of local administration, there has been a decided change in the 

 attitude of the Central Authority. The Committee on Fishery 

 Investigations (1908) reported in favour of the State aid of local 

 fishery authorities in the following terms : " It was urged that 

 inasmuch as the improvement of fisheries was beneficial not only 

 to the immediate localities, but also, in some measure at least, to 

 the nation at large, it was not reasonable that the whole cost should 

 fall upon the ratepayers of the maritime districts, but that a 

 substantial contribution in aid of investigations having this object 

 should be made from Imperial funds. The justice of this contention 

 seems to have been recognised in Scotland and Ireland, where the 

 funds available for the promotion of the local fisheries are not 

 drawn exclusively from the coastal districts, and the Committee 

 are of opinion that a similar principle should be recognised in 

 England and Wales." Apart from some small grants to one or two 

 of the larger committees from the Development Fund, funds which 

 were only obtained in the face of strenuous opposition on the part 

 of the Central Department, the position in 1919 is as it was in 

 1892, when the attention of the Board of Trade was first directed 

 to it. The next complaint of the Departmental Committee is, 

 " there does not appear to be any really effective intercommuni- 

 cation between the different committees, whether by correspondence 

 or otherwise." Now this is obviously one of the duties of the 

 Central Department ; and the conference established by the Act of 

 1888 was designed to facilitate the work of the Board in this respect. 

 The futility of this annual conference, which, it must be borne in 

 mind, is controlled entirely by the Central Authority, was recognised 

 as long ago as igoi by the Lancashire and Western Local Fisheries 

 Committee, who urged the appointment of a committee to draw 

 up suggestions as to the best method of giving more practical 

 usefuhiess to the annual meeting of representatives. The subject 



