When Is a Protection No Protection?

The Goodwin sands is a 16k long sandbank lying 9.7k off the Deal coast in Kent. It was granted Marine Protected Area status due to its extraordinary archeological (including ship wrecks and aircraft) and ecological importance. Now, however, the Marine Management Organisation have approved plans to dredge millions of tonnes of sand and gravel from the structure, to be used to build extensions to the nearby port of Dover (https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/oct/29/plans-to-dredge-notorious-ship-swallower-sandbank-condemned). This very invasive extraction process will have a decimating effect on many of the small organisms (e.g. marine worms, echinoderms sand eels and fish larvae) that inhabit the sandbank and the animals that depend on them (larger fish, birds and marine mammals). The profits will go to the Crown who, for historical reasons, own most such marine locations. This is yet another confirmation that ecological 'protections' are much too easily over-ridden by financial and political considerations in this country.