Issues of illegal cockle picking in a Pembrokeshire seaside village have arisen once again.

A multi-agency operation took place in Saundersfoot towards the end of last year to take positive action regarding reports of illegal cockle picking on the beaches at the seaside village.

As well as members of the local neighbourhood policing team being present, other agencies included - Fisheries, Rural crime officers, Port health, Border force, and Gang masters labour abuse authority. Pembrokeshire County Council were also involved, from a food safety standpoint.

Now county councillor for the village’s south ward, Cllr Chris Williams has highlighted concerns once again.

“The issue of cockle pickers has been brought to my attention again by a few concerned residents. I have spoken to the fisheries department and this month we have looked at putting out two signs at Glen Beach,” explained Cllr Williams.

The information stated as follows is what will be displayed for those not familiar with the byelaws and legislation: ‘No commercial gathering of any Shellfish permitted on this beach. No gathering of Cockle permitted during hours of darkness. For guidance in relation to the taking of shellfish, please refer to the Welsh Government website at www.gov.wales/sea-fisheries'.

Cllr Williams said that he hoped that such signage would help clear up any ‘misunderstanding’ of the current situation.

Last year, the Welsh Government held a consultation on cockling, moving to ensure that it will be a criminal offence to commercially gather cockle from any public cockle bed in Wales without an ‘All Wales’ cockle permit (a person is considered to be commercially gathering if they remove more than 5 kg of cockle from a fishery in a single day).

In light of the potentially hazardous nature of intertidal areas where cockles are gathered, this ease of access to the public fisheries has led to concerns about the safety of inexperienced gatherers. At times these concerns have been exacerbated by large numbers of gatherers accessing cockle beds at once.

In relation to Saundersfoot issues, a spokesperson for the local authority stated last year: “The Glen Beach in Saundersfoot is not classified on health grounds for commercial harvesting of live bivalve molluscs and therefore the harvesting of such products for the food chain is not permitted.”