1 February 2019

Fishing - further messages

We have received the following messages following that received from Candy Rolton : 

Hello  I think all of us who regularly walk and enjoy the meadows are quite frankly sick and tired of these 'fishermen'. Not only do they blatantly disregard the notices stating fishing is banned but are rude and disrespectful, at times even threatening. The lack of action by the borough is quite frankly disgraceful as they take absolutely no action when informed that the fishermen are there. The usual answer I have been given when contacting them is a very hesitant they will try and see what they can do, which to date means no action at all. Bexley Council are very quick to show photographs of the meadows and present it as their 'gem'. Well gems need to be protected and the Borough are failing miserably in their duty of care on this. Can NCRA please put pressure on the Borough. We are all fully behind the association in its defence of the precious green belt, and it would be reassuring to know that the same protection can be applied to the habitat within the green belt particularly our beautiful meadows. Hopefully pressure from the association will achieve what individual members have been unable to do. Best wishes Muriel Simmons

Good Morning, I have read the message from Candy regarding fishing at the Arches. I must admit to feeling very upset at what she witnessed. Candy is right about there being no help or maybe it just feels that way. The boys/men who fish at the arches behave in an untouchable manner - i.e. members of the public would be well advised not to approach them as they are aggressive and abusive. You may have seen a few months ago an email from a resident who did approach them and tell them they should not be fishing and I believe she was met with a tirade of verbal abuse. Not nice for a woman on her own or (a man). There are people fishing at the arches all over the weekend, we walk in the morning and I would imagine its way too early for them to drag themselves out of bed but there are boys/men fishing from 3pm on wards until it gets dark - every weekend. For the last two weekends there has been a younger man fishing on the ground with a "friend" sitting high up in the tree watching for I would imagine the bigger fish.  Last September, I sometimes meet a lady early in the morning who walks her dog - this particular morning I met her, her dog had had all his mouth cut open on a tin of corned beef that some boys had as "bait" for fishing along the river. They were fishing, had the tin of meat on the bank, the dog smelt the food and ran and took the tin and the result was his mouth was cut from front to back by stealing the tin. The lady apologised to them for the dog stealing their bait - I am not quite so sure I would have been that generous and she had a vets bill to pay on top of this !!! Even now, in the cold winter months, where it is dark by 4ish - there are still certain individuals over the arches in the late afternoon bombing around on their motorbikes - it has been happening for a very long time. I read a report from one of the police team who look after this area and it said "at the time she had been to the arches to check on the motorbike incidents - they were not there". There is no capacity for someone to be at the arches every minute or hour of the day until these people are caught and it's a sad fact of life that all of the above will continue as there seems to be NO WAY of stopping the Unstoppables. Name Withheld