Once again we face a big hike in the Rod Licence fees with the usual warnings of dire consequenses if we do not comply.

How is it that this fee is only applicable in England, our Scottish pals pay nothing.

Why does the licence have to run from April to April is it some kind of tax break for the EA.

A lot of Fly fishing is done when the weather is warmer there are very few bodies out before April, most of these are off the water after September so why cant the Environment Agency provide a 6 month licence to cater for this.

Why when fishing on a private lake in England do you need a rod licence anyway , you are not on land owned by by the Environment Agency or fishing waters which are in the public domain .

From my own dealings with the EA most of the licence fees go to pay for their fancy city centre offices and management structures.

You are constantly being told what a sterling job they are doing cleaning up the rivers and streams but with the demise of over 80% of the industry in the UK who is now being blamed for this continuing saga re pollution and how long can they use that as a whip.

The death of heavy industry and the now burgeoning Health & Safety culture has just about made any form of chemical discharge from any source a hanging offence before it gets anywhere near a water course.

It must be noted that the main problem with fish death is down to farmers and the use of man made fertilizers which are washed into the water table and then into the streams which feed the rivers.

Perhaps ICI and their co-producers should dip a bit deeper into their pockets to provide the resource to clean up what they have produced and get the EA off the English anglers backs.

A big hike? The coarse licence has gone up by one whole pound and the migratory fish one by two pounds. And concessions are going to have to find an extra 50p!

I'm 65 in April and it looks like I'll have to fork out the full price with no concessions!!

For a long time now I have advocated that rod licences should be valid for one year. Not from the date of issue but from when they are first checked by an E.A. bailiff when you are fishing. That would get them out of their fancy offices doing their job.

several years ago one e.a. regional office had a notice up which said, "If ****** ****** calls in to report a pollution incident it is to be treated with the utmost urgency." The implication of this is that if you or I average Joe angler reports pollution they don't take it seriously.

In the last 19 years I have had my licence checked twice. Apparently this is quite a high hit rate. once in 1990 and again in 2008. That is 18 years between checks. Has anyone else gone longer?

Cheers
O.T.
(Very OT)

I've never had mine checked since it became organised by the EA but I had one checked when they were regional in about 1977!

Hardly a big hike at a quid. A grand total of fifty odd pence a week to fish for anything but salmon and sea-trout!


And Wales. Scots pay through a permit system I understand


A valid point, there has been much discussion about the sense of having a licence that lasts for 12 months from when you buy it. You can still buy a monthly or day licence though.

Because you are fishing for fish. It is the fish that are licensed not the waters. You may have noticed the two distinct types of licences. One for non-migratory trout, freshwater fish and eels and the other for migratory trout and salmon. No mention of waters!


Can't comment on that one.


Just one source of pollution is motor vehicles. Don't forget also that some pollutants can stay in soils etc for years and slowly get leached out. Most of the EA work that I see on rivers is river management, as in bank works, dredging works, weir and fish ladder repair etc. As long as this is applied sensibly and with a balance to all species of fish in the river it can have huge benefits for the fish and therefore the angler. Worth £70 of my money in my opinion, after all that's why I pay it and consider it cheap.


Emotive and difficult if not impossible to prove



As you said earlier they get hanged if they do pollute the water. As for the EA being on angler's backs, well why not if you don't buy a licence or you do something illegal. The rules are there, they don't make everybody happy, what rules do? In my professional view the rules do more to protect fish stocks and angler's rights than they do harm. It's dirt cheap and easy to buy a licence. Support it, don't fight it.

Another thought (yes I do have them Al). Would it not be much better to introduce a fixed penalty system for licence evasion? Say 10 times the licence fee that should have been paid.

Cheers
OT

The only thing I miss is the old half yearly salmon license as on the rivers here in God's own county of Lancashire the salmon fishing doesn't really start until about August

The same over here but I prefer to call it Darwin's own county

Lets all have a good moan, my car tax is due end of the month so i won't be laughing April 1st when i stick my head round the post office door and say car tax and a salmon license please.

Clearly your lot haven't come down from the trees yet

That's why we've got a head start when it comes to making cider

I bought my last one online (and possibly the one before that too). This time, I thought that I would support the local post office and buy one there. I was also thinking that I could have it in my hands, there and then, as had always been the case before.

First question was whether I'd had one before. Next question was if I had the reminder - well, I received a reminder, but it went straight in the bin, since I've never needed any such thing before. She seemed disappointed in this - apparently it would have saved filling my details in. So we went through filling in my details anew, and I paid my money. But no licence. Instead, a receipt, usable with ID, in lieu of the real thing, which will arrive in the post shortly. Just as if I'd not gone to the bother of walking to the post office and had instead done it online from the comfort of my own office. Which is what I shall do next year.

Still, at least I won't have to fold it to fit it in my wallet, and it will have a picture of a perch on it.

I had the opposite experience! I tried to renew mine online from the comfort of my desk, but after 10 minutes got to the dreaded 'verified by visa' screen and, being at work and not home, didn't have the card reader thingie to hand (I hate those things). So I cancelled that and took both my reminder letters to the post office this lunchtime. The woman scanned them, took my money and gave me receipts. Sorted!

That will teach me to bin things without looking at them properly!

I did it on line as usual. It struck me as odd that I had to fill in a form with details that they already had. Then it struck me as downright bloody annoying when I had to fill all the details in again to buy one for my other half! You would think that the "Buy another licence" option would bypass some of that, or am I being thick?
Of course the system seems to have screwed up at the unimaginable idea of two licences for the same house, so it's only sent me one email receipt (luckily it's for mine).

Still, if it wasn't for my fifty two quid how would they restock the Mersey with salmon that I will never fish for and how would they afford the four wheel drives and night vision googles they need for patrolling remote Lake District streams for salmon poachers at 2am (on double time)?