The City Corporation wants Billingsgate to thrive as asuccessful fish market, with full employment, and we are workingwith the fish merchants in a number of areas to achieve that. Onspecific points raised by Unite:The byelaw relevant to porters, dating from 1876, permits theSuperintendent to licence anyone of "good character and fitness" tobe a porter. The licence is, therefore, a permit to work butdoes not guarantee employment, nor does it guarantee standards,which are a matter for employers.

The City can grant as many licences as it chooses, to anyonewho fulfils the criteria of being of good character and fit.So this byelaw is obsolete, out-of-date, irrelevant in moderntimes, and could be criticised for bureaucratically restrictingfreedom of employment.

Porters are employed by individual fish merchants and anydiscussions about employment must be taken up with them or theirrepresentative body, the London Fish MerchantsAssociation.The City doesn"t employ any porters.

All other aspects of the byelaws have been reviewed and arecovered by aspects of Food Hygiene or Health & Safetylegislation, Employment Law, or can be covered in leases.

Like all markets, Billingsgate has succeeded in the past byadapting to changing circumstances and we want to see that successcontinue in an increasing competitive environment. The future ofthe market is not in any way jeopardised by revoking the byelaw andremoving the licensing requirement.