Mass sea life deaths which have led to growing discontent in the fishing industry will be placed under the spotlight at a special select committee this week. 

PD Ports, the Environment Agency, and a Whitby fishing association will all be giving evidence to MPs about the mass sea deaths next week.

The Environment, Food and Rural Affairs select committee will hold a session on October 25 in parliament to hear from witnesses about the crustacean deaths.

Committee chair Conservative Sir Richard Goodwill, who is the MP for Scarborough and Whitby, branded the situation “disturbing” when he announced the probe.

The first sightings of dead and twitching crustacea were in October 2021, however, just last month starfish, crabs, shellfish and hundreds of razor clams were spotted on the beach between Marske and Saltburn.

Read more: Government accused of 'cover up' over mass crab deaths on North East coast

Fishermen on the Teesside and North Yorkshire coast have also been affected by significantly smaller catches.

Last month, a study commissioned by the North East Fishing Collective into the mass die-offs concluded that “pyridine in seawater is highly toxic to crabs even at low levels, showing indicators of attacking the nervous system as evidenced by the twitching and convulsive behaviours.”

When the initial findings were released, the report had not been per-reviewed.

Pyridine was discovered in both near-shore and offshore sediments, according to scientists. The report also claimed that Teesside industrial plant Vertellus handled large amounts of the chemical before 2019.

Read more: The shocking six months which saw North East beaches ruined by dead and rotting crabs

Campaigners are worried that dredging has unearthed historical toxins, however, PD Ports told a new BBC documentary which aired on Friday night (October 21), We are England: Trouble at Sea, that the practice is not to blame as it is taking out “virgin sand.”

Teesworks has also been dredging since September but during the first eight-week phase it will be depositing on land, it won’t start depositing at sea until next year.

Defra has concluded the cause of the crab deaths to be a naturally occurring algal bloom.

There will be three committee hearings starting at 2:30pm on Tuesday October 25 about the issue.

The first session will hear evidence from the science director at the Centre for Environment, Fisheries and Aquaculture Science, Rachel Hartnell, the managing director of PD ports Jeremy Hopkinson, Environment Agency deputy director for water and land quality Mark Rice and the Marine Management  Organisation’s head of licencing Trudi Wakelin.

Read more: Read the Government's report into crab and lobster deaths along North East coast

The second hearing, starting at 3:15pm, will include evidence from Dr Gary Caldwell, an academic at the School of Natural and Environmental Sciences at Newcastle University, Tim Deere Jones, a marine pollution consultant, and Dr Rodney Forster who specialises in marine and coastal ecology at Hull University.

The final session at 4pm will hear from David McCandless, a chief officer at the North Eastern Fishing and Conservation Authority, and Whitby Commercial Fishing Association secretary Joe Redfern.

Councillors on the Tees Valley Combined Authority’s (TVCA) overview and scrutiny board put pressure on Tory metro mayor Ben Houchen to secure an invite to the committee.

A spokesperson for the Defra committee, however, confirmed that the TVCA had not been invited to give evidence due to time constraints meaning it is limited on the number of witnesses it can ask. PD ports is invited as it is the harbour authority for the River Tees.

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