The British fishing industry was let down by the previous government and now our trawler Kirkella is tied up in port - Jane Sandell

What is more, by reversing the mistakes of the past few years, Defra could realistically attract tens of millions of pounds in desperately needed investment to the Humberside region. I want to tell you how.

The reasons why Kirkella, the last remaining representative of a once-proud British distant waters fleet, is now standing idle are relatively simple to explain in an industry whose workings are often fiendishly complex. She has no quota left to fish.

Before Brexit she would be bringing home around 20,000 tonnes of whitefish (mostly cod and haddock) each year from the icy waters off the Norwegian coast, in and around the Barents Sea and from a small pocket in the Atlantic east of Newfoundland.

This is the only British-caught fish from these areas to be sold through the nation’s chippies as part of our national dish.

This year, Kirkella has been limited to catching around 6,500 tonnes, and the shortfall has been imported from countries like Norway, Greenland, Iceland and – shamefully – even Russia.

Why? Because a succession of fisheries ministers simply failed to instruct their negotiating teams at Defra to deliver the same result for Britain in fisheries talks with our partners around the North Sea as the much-maligned Common Fisheries Policy achieved prior to Brexit.

Before 2019, the complex interplay of Total Allowable Catches, quotas and swaps of different species in different waters and between different fishing nations was settled in a round of talks that took place every autumn.

For us, the most important of these by far were the arrangements between Norway and the EU (of which Britain was then of course a member).

This is because traditionally, Kirkella and her two sister ships (both of which have been disposed of due to lack of fishing opportunities) caught the majority of their fish in Norwegian waters, in return for which Norway was offered important trade concessions by the EU.

In short, Brussels negotiators did a far better job for Britain than we have since done for ourselves.

We still don’t really understand how this came about, but for a huge majority of vessels, and not just our own, the promised Brexit “Sea of Opportunity” for the industry has completely failed to materialise.

That a tiny handful of wealthy owners of large mackerel vessels (around 25) have enjoyed a remarkable quota bonanza since 2019 is scant consolation to the 5,000 boats who have missed out.

As well as losing two ships, we have had to lay off most of our crew, many of whose families had been fishers for generations.

Anyone who has family or friends in the industry will know of the devastation this caused to those men, their families and the economic and social fabric of the region.

In our darkest moments, we at UK Fisheries have feared for the future of the industry as a whole.

Our Dutch and Icelandic owners, who once saved this industry for Britain when no UK company was prepared to do so, cannot be expected to maintain their involvement in the face of what has often felt like a government that did not value foreign investment at all, or at least not in fishing.

But perhaps the tide is now turning. We have experienced a new willingness to listen at Defra, guided by a Fisheries Minister who seems genuinely interested in preserving and growing fisheries in a way that is truly balanced for every sector and every region, not just a privileged few.

It would not take much to begin healing the damage wrought by past mistakes. All it will require is the political will to strike a deal with the Norwegians and others that reflects the importance to those countries of trade with the UK. To put it simply, if they want to continue selling to us on preferential terms, they need to offer something back in the form of the kind of access to fish in their waters that we enjoyed only a few years ago.

And I’ve saved the best till last. I know that our owners want UK Fisheries, and its British crews and their families, to thrive. They are willing to invest in new vessels and facilities in Britain if only we are willing to give them reason to. The sums could be substantial; but the value to the future of this centuries-old industry would be far greater still.

Jane Sandell is CEO of UK Fisheries.