'It'd be the end': blow for fishers in row with holiday home owners

For the past 40 years, Richard Clarke has fished for lobsters, crab, herring and bass off the coast of Sea Palling in north Norfolk.

- Donna Ferguson

For the past 40 years, Richard Clarke has fished for lobsters, crab, herring and bass off the coast of Sea Palling in north Norfolk. Now, he fears his fishing days are numbered after a dispute with holiday home owners about whether he should be allowed to store his boats near their properties.

North Norfolk district council (NNDC) has ruled it is not lawful for fishers to continue to use the field off a road, the Marrams, to store boats for fishing and recreation, despite acknowledging the site has been used by fishers for more than a decade.

"We will find it hard to continue if we don't have the use of this field," said Clarke, 55, a third-generation fisher who has been storing his boats in the small shingled yard for 35 years, alongside those of his brother Jason. "It's so important to us. Without it, we couldn't operate - it would be the end of our fishing careers."