The controversial ban on fishpots is working -- despite 40 illegal pots being discovered in the last month alone, a Government official said yesterday.

Director of Agriculture and Fisheries Mr. John Barnes admitted fisheries rules were difficult to enforce.

But he said: "We have certainly found quite a few fishpots and our investigations are ongoing.

"The salient point with fishpots before the ban was the amount of effort put in by fishermen.

"They were out 24 hours a day, 365 days a year and fishpots were a very powerful fishing tool.

"The situation is certainly better than when there were thousands of them out there.

"By getting rid of them, we reduced fishing by an enormous amount. Even with some illegal ones, it's relieving the pressure on fish stocks.'' Mr. Barnes was speaking after newly-appointed Environment Minister Pamela Gordon told the House of Assembly that illegal fishpots did not help the fishing industry's pleas for extra assistance.

When Ms Gordon replaced Mr. Tim Smith just over a week ago, she pledged to take another look at the fishpot ban.

But she later told the House in her maiden speech as Environment Minister that the law had to be respected and the Government could only sit down with fishermen to discuss their problems if the industry was prepared to "come to the table with integrity''.

Mr. Barnes said, despite the problem of illegal fishpots, the ban was "accomplishing its objective, which is to protect the reef fish''.

But he said the resources available to him made policing the ban an uphill struggle.

He pointed out that there were more than 400 Police officers for around 20 square miles of Island, while he had a relative handful of inspectors to deal with 200 square miles of regularly fished areas plus overall responsibility for a total of 135,000 square miles of ocean.

"It's a big area and we could use more staff -- but everybody in Government could use more staff, it's a question of paying for them.'' But he added regular users of the water, like divers and sailors, could play a part in beating illegal fishing -- if they knew what to look for.

He said: "Members of the public are very valuable and we get a lot of information from them.

"We would like more cooperation and we would like to educate them more because they don't always realise what's going on.''