Unheeded warnings

Alan Sledmore, of Hest Bank, said he was "devastated" and "disillusioned" that his warnings went unheeded.

"Perhaps they will listen now," said Mr Sledmore.

His concerns in October received public support from George Crossman, station officer with Arnside Coastguard, and again in December by Keith Budden, chairman of Bolton-le-Sands Parish Council.

At the Morecambe Bay Partnership Conference in October, Mr Sledmore called on the attending North Western and North Wales Sea Fisheries Committee to seriously reconsider plans to re-open Red Bank.

Mr Sledmore, 55, told the conference that the bed - situated two-and-half miles off shore and bordered by two fast-flowing channels - was so uniquely dangerous that health and safety or a registration system should be considered.

He told the Gazette at the time that inexperienced cocklers were most at risk.

"In winter, you get high tides and more rainfall and the fog. If the fog comes down and you have got 200 people out there, they wouldn't know what they were doing. There would be a tragedy out there."

In response to Mr Sledmore's concerns, Dr Jim Andrews, the chief fisheries officer with the NWNWSFC, told the Gazette at the time: "It is not for me to stand on a beach and tell fishermen when it is safe to go fishing.

"How fishermen exercise their discretion with regard to health and safety is not my concern. If we don't open it, the finger of blame can be pointed at us. This is a big part of the British fishing industry."

But he did add that fisheries officers took every precaution necessary when going out.

Mr Sledmore said this week: "I don't get any gratification from this at all. I wish that I had been wrong. I must admit that after the first few weeks went past after they opened it and nothing happened, I thought I must have been wrong and that it was not going to happen, but unfortunately it has."

Of the conference, Mr Sledmore said: "I went along, expecting a debate but there were no local fishermen there. Everyone was shouting me down saying something like that was not going to happen."

He added: "The week before this happened the tides were very low and very slow. But when it happened, you had a double whammy of floodwater coming down the Kent and Keer and the faster, higher tides above nine metres, when usually they are about seven-and-a-half metres. When they have got to the Keer the tide would have been running and they would have needed to cross it. What people don't realise is that when in water above your knees it is very difficult to walk through and the higher the water is the harder it gets.

"You can only imagine what it's like. I have been in a position where I have had to walk through cold sea water, your feet are blue."

Mr Budden said this week that cockling had been allowed to become a dangerous, free-for-all activity.

The Bolton-le-Sands councillor said vast numbers were allowed to work freely in dangerous conditions.

Mr Budden said: "If you work on a building site you would not be able to without a hard hat, if you work on a railway line you are not allowed to without a highly visible jacket.

"People have been allowed to go out there without any type of equipment. In the summer months, there are many, many cross bay walks that take place without difficulty but that is only because they are well-organised, in daylight, and there are official guides and reasonable precautions are taken. But here we are talking about a large-scale industrial operation and there has to be more control over something as big as that, which has plant machinery, vans, wagons and an infrastructure. It was no little cottage industry because you had 150 to 180 people out there a day."

He added that a lack of regulation or co-ordination meant rescuers had no way of knowing or confirming how many people were in trouble.