Copyright 1999 Times Newspapers Limited

The Times (London)

August 14, 1999, Saturday

SECTION: Features

LENGTH: 1108 words

HEADLINE: 'There's no toxins in our shellfish'

BYLINE: Gillian Harris

BODY:

A ban across 8,000 square miles of Scotland's west coast could bankrupt its scallop divers, says Gillian Harris.

On a fine summer's day, Douglas Chirnside would like nothing more than to pull on his wet suit and go diving for scallops in the clear waters off the coast of Argyll.

Instead, he and his fellow fishermen are stuck at home in the village of Tayvallich, losing money. For more than three weeks they have been barred from diving for shellfish since poisonous toxins were discovered in scallops.

The fishing ban, the biggest in the world, extends over more than 8,000 square miles, from Cape Wrath in the north to the Hebridean islands of Islay and Jura in the south. It was imposed and has been extended twice by the Scottish Executive to protect people from amnesic shellfish poisoning (ASP), which causes headaches, memory loss and, in extreme cases, irreversible brain damage. An outbreak in New Brunswick, Canada, in 1986 affected 150 people and killed four.

The 200 shellfish farmers, who work on the west coast of Scotland and have accepted the ban so far, are now voicing concerns. They claim it is indiscriminate and, in the long term, could cripple Scotland's lucrative shellfish industry. Some believe they will be forced out of business if the ban continues to ignore tests which show that shellfish in their area are non-toxic.

August should be one of the busiest months of the year for scallop fishermen. The long hours of daylight and clement weather are ideal for diving. Before the ban Chirnside, his partner Hans Unkles and their colleague Fraser Jackson set out each day in their 33ft boat, White Heather, to fish from dawn to dusk.

The men would take turns to dive up to 120ft, prise shellfish off the seabed and collect them in a string bag. Sometimes they stayed out overnight so they could travel further afield in search of fresh scallop beds.

Their catch, which fetched a higher price than farmed shellfish because it was hand-picked, was sold to seafood restaurants in the Highlands and to buyers in Spain and France. Scottish scallops are a delicacy in Europe - although it remains to be seen whether their reputation will survive the latest health scare.

On July 9, the day the ban was imposed, Chirnside and his colleagues were diving off the west coast of Mull. They received a telephone call on board the boat to tell them the bad news. They had no choice but to dump almost a tonne of shellfish in the North Atlantic.

Chirnside, 31, says: "In some ways we are luckier than most fishermen. We are able to diversify by doing a little creel fishing for prawns, which are not affected by the ban, and we have thought about moving outside the ban down to the Forth of Clyde - although I have heard it is very busy down there."

Other fishermen have moved to the east coast and have begun harvesting shellfish from the North Sea. "They have to do something," says Chirnside. "This ban is having a big financial impact. At the moment shellfish fishermen on the west coast are not bringing in any money and they are beginning to struggle."

As weeks pass with no sign of the ban being lifted, shellfish fishermen are looking for someone to blame for the proliferation of toxins which the Government insists occur naturally. Many are pointing their fingers at the salmon farms dotted along the west coast. According to Alan Berry, a former chairman of the Association of Scottish Shellfish Growers and an expert on toxins, the waste produced by salmon farms and pumped into the sea contains large quantities of ammonia which can cause ASP.

His claims are supported by Friends of the Earth (FoE) which has called on the Government to investigate a possible link between salmon farms and ASP. Don Staniford, a marine research officer with FoE, says: "Salmon farms have been allowed to develop over the past 20 years without adequate regulation or control. We are calling on the Scottish parliament to carry out an urgent review into the remarkable coincidence between the predominance of salmon farms and the areas where ASP has been found."

The Government, however, says ASP is caused by naturally occuring algal blooms. Iain Gray, the Scottish deputy health minister, says: "The monitoring of the areas affected will continue until the toxin levels fall below the legal limit and our advisers tell us it is safe to lift the ban."

Bill Crowe, of the Scottish Salmon Growers' Association, dismisses the suggestion of a link as "innuendo, half-truths and distortions". He would welcome an inquiry to prove salmon farms are not responsible for the build-up of toxins.

Those who make a living from selling scallops, oysters and mussels, whose industry is worth around Pounds 2 million a year, find nothing to reassure them. Bob Parry, who runs a 30-hectare scallop farm on the Isle of Skye, is losing money because he cannot sell his shellfish to local hotels and restaurants during the busy tourist season. "If this ban lasts another month then things are going to start to get serious," he says.

Other farmers, who are losing an average of Pounds 5,000 a week, are equally frustrated by the timing of the ban which will have a knock-on effect on their income for the rest of the year.

"It is having a significant effect," says Duncan MacInnes, secretary of the Western Isles Fishermen's Association. "We certainly think that after two weeks of low readings in our area there is no reason to have such a large area closed. Markets are in desperate need of supplies and there is a loss of revenue in an industry which is vitally important in the Highlands and Islands."

Doug McLeod, chairman of the ASSG, finds himself in the difficult position of supporting the ban for safety reasons but sympathising with his members who are growing more impatient and worried by the day.

"As an association we endorse and support the monitoring system and obviously we do not want customers to have any worries about the purity of our shellfish," he says.

"Most of our members do get tested regularly throughout the summer months and have no hesitation about closing down if there is any problem, but the one difference this year is that the ban covers such a large area.

"The feeling seems to be that it should stay in place until there are no toxins in the whole area, which we think is unfair when there are samples showing that the shellfish in some places are clear.

"This ban is blowing a hole in the shellfish growers' cash flow in the middle of high season. It could have a serious knock-on effect for the industry and will certainly hit profits."