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March 21, 2025

Yet another year of government-sanctioned overfishing of our depleted seas

The UK Government has rubberstamped the overfishing of more than half of our fish populations once again this year. Yesterday, analysis by the government’s own advisors revealed that the government is completely ignoring expert scientific advice and putting our seas at grave risk.

In practical terms, this means that for over 50% of fish populations, including cod and mackerel, our government has chosen to allow fish to be caught at greater rates that they can replenish, condemning them to further decline and even collapse.

Even more shockingly, these headline stats remain exactly the same as last year, indicating no overall progress over the past 12 months. We may have a new government but it seems the same old political choice is being made: to take the route of least resistance rather than delivering what is needed. We cannot keep on allowing the marine environment to be destroyed for profit rather than thinking seriously about how to deliver a just transition for the fishing industry so that food production no longer costs the earth.

Overfishing is one of the biggest threats to marine life. With the UK’s seas so extensively overfished, it is little wonder then that our incredible ocean wildlife is in freefall. Sea life as varied as the flapper skate, the angel shark and the European eel all face serious risk of extinction, as do the five new seabird species added to the ‘Red List’ last year. Overfishing is depleting the food sources of these birds, and putting them at serious risk.  This disregard for nature cannot go on.

Overfishing drives inequality

The government may be signing off on continued overfishing in the belief that this move supports the fishing industry. However, these decisions not only undermine the very existence of any UK fishing industry in the long term, they also drive inequality right now.

Any economic benefit from overfishing overwhelmingly accumulates in the hands of just a few wealthy, powerful operators while small, low-impact boats get increasingly squeezed out and struggle to make a living as fish numbers dwindle.

Small fishing boats make up 79% of the UK fleet by number but they receive less than 2% of the fishing allowance, as well as being underrepresented in policy discussions and decision-making processes.

Meanwhile, 26 supertrawlers spent 37,000 hours fishing in the UK’s supposed marine protected areas in the past five years, Greenpeace recently reported. These are vast factory ships over 100 metres in length which scoop up hundreds of tonnes of fish a day in their enormous nets, along with bycatch including porpoises, sharks and seals.

What’s more, almost all of these industrial overfishers belonged to international companies and sold much of their catch overseas, meaning they profit off the destruction of our seas while returning little or no value to the UK.

Mission regeneration

In the context of this environmental and economic injustice, you might expect an immediate crisis response from government before we reach the point of total collapse. But instead we have year after year of delay and incremental changes to a total broken system.

It’s time for the government to start making decisions in the public interest and to stand up for our wildlife, for ocean lovers, and for those low-impact fishers who are doing the right things, rather than allowing Big Industry to line its pockets through overexploitation of public resources.

This is all a political choice, and there is a different choice available. Oceana has set out a roadmap of actions for the UK government to in our recent Mission Regeneration report – but they’re still not listening yet. If you share our outrage that our government is allowing Big Industry to plunder our ocean – join us, follow us, and speak up for our seas!