European designated Marine Special Area of Conservation ? its a sick joke.

I had been waiting with some eager anticipation for a report from Mark Williams, skipper of the Briggs/Environment Agency survey vessel "Water Guardian". He along with Dan Worth were on passage from Aberystwyth to Milford Haven yesterday starting at first light. The first leg of the voyage is a straight line from Aberystwyth to Strumble Head, straight through the SAC. I have just spoke to Mark and he tells me conditions were good with calm seas but they saw nothing.

Nothing that is except for a dozen or more scallop dredgers trawling their heavy sets of dredges over the sea bed of Cardigan Bay Special Area of Conservation.

There can be no more effective way of destroying the marine animal communities for which the bay is world famous and for which it gained this designation.

It beggars belief that the Welsh Government allows this to continue at the same time as spending hundreds of thousands of pounds organising talking shops to discuss new marine protected areas. What is the point of designating such areas if there is no real protection? I guess it keeps the suits in a job...