Notes

THE President of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries has just appointed a departmental committee to advise the Board as to the steps which could be taken with advantage for the preservation and development of the inshore fisheries. The committee consists of Sir E. S. Howard, chairman of the Wye Board of Conservators; Sir K. S. Anderson, chairman of the Orient Steam Navigation Company; Sir S. Fay, manager of the Great Central Railway Company; Sir Norval Helme, M.P., a manufacturer; the Hon. T. H. W. Pelham, of the Harbours Department of the Board of Trade; Mr. Norman Craig, M.P.; Mr. W. Brace, a Labour M.P.; Mr. J. W. Beaumont Pease, vice-chairman of Lloyds Bank; Mr. C. Hellyer, a trawl-vessel owner; Mr. S. Bostock; and Mr. Cecil Harmsworth, M.P. Commerce and finance on the great scale are thus well represented, and no doubt the committee will be able to supplement the knowledge of the inshore fisheries which it may not possess by accepting evidence from those who do possess it. The interests of the inshore fishermen are opposed to those of the steam-trawling industry on one hand, and of the salmon fisheries on the other, and this is, no doubt, the reason why the only two fishery members of the committee are a prominent owner of steam fishing vessels and the chairman of a very important board of salmon fisheries. Those who know the highly technical occupations of the inshore fishermen will also know that the whole question of the decadence of these industries must by and by involve a scientific knowledge of the natural conditions under which inshore fishing is carried on. Yet the committee does not contain a scientific man, and it is unlikely that its members can acquire second-hand, from expert evidence, that knowledge of the “inwardness” of technical marine biology which can alone render their advice to the Board of permanent value.