Fisheries Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick and Lord Cameron of Dillington

Report stage & Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Report: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 24th June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick [V]]

My Lords, I support the aims of this new clause in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Teverson. For me, it is about marine conservation science around data collection. I have a number of questions, some for the Minister and some for the noble Lord.

I have been carrying out some research into the implications of this clause and I fully understand why we want data collection. As the noble Lord, Lord Randall, said, it can assist in climate change, informing us about the migratory movements of fish species and the volume of particular species in certain waters, and whether new species have come into certain waters as a result of the impact of climate change. All that information is very beneficial in determining fishing policy. If the new clause were approved, it would make a vital contribution to an ecosystem-based approach to fisheries management through the generation of information on known targets and protected species captured by fishing gears. Such information would provide details about the level of discards and invaluable information about the nature and status of commercial stocks, and obviously it would bring about compliance with the landing obligation.

I am aware that there is some concern in the fishing industry about the impact of this clause if it were accepted. Can the Minister, who has been very gracious with his time the last few days, say what discussions have taken place with the devolved Administrations, since fisheries are a devolved matter, about remote monitoring? I know that these devices would be placed in the working areas of the boats and not in the private areas, because that was a concern for the fishing industry as well.

I would also be most grateful if the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, could say who will police the remote monitoring and who will pay for it. I am mindful that fisheries management works in partnership with the industry; the various devolved Administrations and the Government have to work with the fish producer organisations, the skippers, the fishers and the processors, as a consequence of all of that.

Those are my questions, and if the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, presses his amendment to a Division, I will support it.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington [V]]

My Lords, remote electronic monitoring will be hugely important to the future management of our fisheries, for a variety of reasons.

First, we do not have the resources to police all our waters. We will soon have the largest independent national fisheries area on the continent. If no one can fish our waters without REM, both home boats and foreign boats, at least we will know, in real time, what is going on and whether boats are fulfilling their obligations under their licences.

Secondly, it is said that 40% of all catch taken in Europe is currently caught in what will become British waters, so if we can strictly manage and police that catch all around the UK, we will have a chance of leading the field and becoming an example to others in managing a sustainable fisheries regime.

Thirdly, we all know that discards are still happening, as the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, mentioned. While sympathising with the problems of choke species, we have to be firm about this, while of course helping and encouraging the industry to find its own non-discard solutions—one of which is the intelligent use of REM, which I will come to.

The main reason for REM, which I would like to focus on, is data, as the title of this amendment highlights. Data is vital to the proper management of our fisheries and is in relatively short supply. That is why there are often disputes between scientists and fishers about the accuracy of the data on which MSY figures are based, and whether this data is sufficiently up to date, et cetera. Now we have the chance of every single fishing boat becoming a scientific research vessel, sending back data on an hourly basis.

The Government have announced that they would like to change the basis of the quota system from relative stability to one of zonal attachment. For that you need a lot more data analysis, because the main idea behind zonal attachment is that you look at the entire life cycle of the fish, where they live at any particular point in time and where and when they are of the right size and in the right quantities to be caught. You need an awful lot of data to make the right assessment, and, of course, that data will vary for each individual species.

We must remember that the seas are always changing, and so are the habits and population development of the fish within them. So it is only right that the industry should play a major part in the data gathering needed for modern fisheries management. Furthermore, as I mentioned in Committee, one of the tools for avoiding the overcatch of choke species is giving the fishing boats real-time knowledge of what is being caught and where, so that they can more easily avoid the choke problem areas. Again, for fisheries authorities, real-time data is vital to help them control the problem of overfishing. Norway and Iceland already impose real-time closures of areas of water where sensitive species are suddenly being overfished, but the key to this policy is detailed and open data, provided by REM.

Eventually, all boats, including the under-10s, will have to have REM on board. As the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, touched on, I cannot believe that supermarkets will—or should—continue to allow sales of fish from their counters which have come from boats of whatever size that are not totally open about what they have caught and where. So the supermarkets, too, should be insisting on REM.

The national administration in the USA has recently taken the decision on REM that there is no need for further piloting; they just need to get on and do it. New Zealand has also taken the decision to roll it out across the whole of its fleet. I believe that we should do likewise.

Fisheries Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick and Lord Cameron of Dillington

Report stage & Report stage (Hansard): House of Lords & Report: 1st sitting & Report: 1st sitting: House of Lords
Monday 22nd June 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cameron of Dillington [V]]

My Lords, it is always my ambition to kick-start a change in a Bill in Committee and, hopefully, persuade the Government to pick up the baton and run with their own amendment based on my and others’ suggestions—although in a better format, with better language and so on. However, it seems that an equal and alternative route to success is to get the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, to pick up the baton and table his excellent amendment—albeit, I understand, with a little help from Defra.

I spoke in Committee, probably for too long as usual, on the need to positively link the aspirations of the objectives in Clause 1 to some of the more practical implementation sections of the Bill. When it came to Clause 25 I highlighted, probably again at too great a length, that this was a key place for ensuring that the objectives, and what the Government meant by them, were spelled out loud and clear for the industry to understand. I believe I may even have mentioned virtually all the criteria listed in subsections (2) and (3) of this excellent new version of Clause 25.

So I strongly support Amendment 28. I support both its sustainability ambitions and its clarity, moving, as the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, said, from Euro-speak to British common sense. The only possible slight improvement that I might have made would have been to say that the fisheries authorities should have a duty to clearly communicate their criteria and the reasons for them to all fisher men and women in their area by whatever means possible. I have assumed that this is implicit in the amendment, but I would be grateful if the Minister could confirm that.

I know it is standard procedure for Governments of all hues to resist all amendments if they possibly can, so I really congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Lansley. I thank the Government, and in particular I thank and congratulate the Minister in advance for having listened and responded to the points made in Committee and for gripping this issue and thus greatly improving the Bill.

[Baroness Ritchie of Downpatrick [V]]

My Lords, I find that I have a certain sympathy with Amendments 9 and 28. Like the noble Lord, Lord Lansley—who moved Amendment 9—and the noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington, I think that it is important to link the fisheries objectives to the practicalities of the Bill in terms of outworking, effort quotas and quotas generally. Can the Minister clarify whether those will be based on the science in terms of historic catches?

For a long time, fishermen, the fishing industry and fishers generally were concerned that quotas did not always relate to what was in the sea—that is, the volume of particular species of fish. They felt that the science was not necessarily always accurate. I would appreciate it if the Minister could provide in his winding-up speech an update on how the outworking of the Bill, including the intentions of this amendment, will reflect the requirements regarding gear and the science, as well as how the science will direct and fuel the quota arrangements and allocations, so that fishermen do not feel that they are penalised in future.