Fisheries Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Young of Old Scone and Lord Krebs

Committee stage & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 9th March 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Krebs (CB)]

My Lords, it is a great pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, who has expressed so eloquently many of the points I want to make. I shall try to avoid repeating them; nevertheless, I want to extend the argument. I agree with the noble Lord that if the Government are to make only one change to the Fisheries Bill, this should be it.

The purpose Amendment 124, in my name and those of my noble friend Lady Worthington and the noble Lord, Lord Randall of Uxbridge, is to ensure that all boats fishing in UK waters are fitted with remote electronic monitoring. My amendment focuses on data collection as opposed to the discard ban, but the two are not incompatible and REM would support both. If we introduce it on a phased basis and with consultation, as the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, suggested, it could be achieved in a way that does not disrupt the industry. It will be accepted internationally as the way to collect accurate data on what is being taken from the sea, to inform the scientific analysis of sustainability.

As the Minister said last Wednesday,

“One of the things that we must all wrestle with is that currently, we do not have adequate scientific information on all stocks and we need a better assessment”.


This will help to achieve that. The Minister also said:

“Where we cannot make such an assessment, we will gather scientific data so that such an assessment is possible”.—[Official Report, 4/3/20; cols. 652-53.]


Well, here is a method of contributing to that. Without direct on-board monitoring of fish catch, there would be a crucial gap in the scientific data on which to assess sustainable harvests. As the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, has already said, while we were in the CFP it was argued that compelling our boats to deploy REM would put them at a disadvantage compared with fishers from other countries. That in itself tells you something about fishers’ behaviour. But now we have taken back control, we can set our own rules to require all boats in UK waters, whether or not they are UK-registered boats, to operate on a level playing field with REM fitted to their boats.

It was also argued that it was unaffordable and not suitable for smaller boats—the under 10-metre fleet. However, a recent report on the San José gillnet fishery in Peru, concluded that

“small-scale fishing vessel remote electronic monitoring offers potential for affordable at sea monitoring costs in coastal fisheries.”

I am told that there are also new technologies—the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, referred to this—such as Shellcatch, which is cheap and easy to use. Is the Minister aware of Shellcatch and similar technologies, the use of which would be a very appropriate step for the Government to take?

The proposed new Clause in Amendment 124 would also require all boats to have GPS, so that their location is known, and it would require the establishment of a framework for monitoring and enforcement to prevent illegal fishing. The accurate collection of data is always important in fisheries management, but even more so as the Government are intent on pursuing the mistaken notion that maximum sustainable yield is the right way to manage sustainable fisheries. At Second Reading, I pointed out the folly of this proposition, but my warning did not seem to elicit a warm response, so I am going to repeat it at greater length now, for the record.

I am delighted that the notion of experts seems to be coming back into fashion, because I will refer to a number of experts in fisheries science. I first quote from two of the leading fisheries scientists of the 20th century. Canada’s P.A. Larkin, one of the leading fisheries scientists of his generation, wrote in his 1977 paper An Epitaph for the Concept of Maximum Sustained Yield:

“In many ways, it is a pity that now, just as the concept of MSY has reached a world-wide distribution and is on the verge of world-wide application, it must be abandoned.”


J.A. Gulland, who wrote the world-standard FAO manual on fisheries science, said:

“It is very doubtful if the attainment of MSY from any one stock of fish should be the objective of management except in exceptional circumstances”.


I also consulted two colleagues who are fisheries experts: Professor Marc Mangel from the University of California, arguably the top fisheries scientist in the United States, and Professor Sir John Beddington, former Government Chief Scientific Adviser and adviser to the UK Government in international fisheries negotiations. Both confirmed that MSY is not a desirable tool for fisheries management. Professor Mangel said:

“MSY as a management tool simply won’t go away, regardless of evidence that ‘managing for MSY’ has not been effective”,


and

“MSY is a very dangerous fishery management target unless one knows lots about the stock, about fishing mortality, and has the ability to really control fishing effort (particularly shut it down if needed). MSY is generally not used as a target in North America.”

Sir John Beddington is even blunter in his assessment that there is complete consensus among fisheries scientists that to set harvest levels at MSY is not appropriate. I apologise for going on at some length about MSY, but also note that I could have gone on a lot longer. Instead, I commend to those who would like to follow up my points a book entitled Quantitative Fisheries Stock Assessment, by Hilborn and Walters.

Sadly, the Government are committed to a misguided fisheries policy. I am not an expert fisheries scientist, but I have looked carefully at the issue and consulted experts, and the consequences of this misguided policy will be felt by UK fishers in the years ahead. I urge the Minister to listen to world fisheries experts and consider whether the Bill needs to be changed accordingly. However, I am not optimistic that the Government are prepared to do that, so, at the very least, they should agree to record properly what is being caught and where, so that when things go wrong—as they certainly will—they can change the policy. This amendment would enable the Government to do just that.

The noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, asked why the amendment refers to phasing in REM rather than introducing it straight away. I have talked to people involved in this in the Chilean fishery, where REM is required on boats over 15 metres long. I was told—as was the Select Committee chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Teverson—that a culture change has to go with the introduction of REM. Consultation and phasing in would therefore enable the Government to achieve buy-in from the fishing industry, particularly the important, smaller boats under 10 metres long.

That does not undermine the fundamental objective: to gain accurate data to enable us to manage our fisheries, in spite of our aiming for the undesirable target of MSY. We can manage the fisheries with good data, and change the plan when the data demands it.

[Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab)]

My Lords—

Conservation of Habitats and Species (Amendment) (EU Exit) Regulations 2019

Debate between Baroness Young of Old Scone and Lord Krebs

Wednesday 6th March 2019 Grand Committee

[Lord Krebs (CB)]

I welcome and appreciate the Minister’s introduction. Overall, what he said is reassuring. In addition to the point that has already been made, I want to pick up on scientific input, which was mentioned in the Minister’s introduction. Will he clarify in a little more detail the point that changes will be allowed only due to “technical and scientific progress”? The statutory instrument does not specify where the expert input will come from and whether it will involve the statutory nature conservation advisers. Will the Minister elaborate a little on the nature of the scientific input, how it will be taken into account, the degree of transparency in the publication of any scientific advice and how it will work across the four nations of the United Kingdom?

[Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for his exposition on these three statutory instruments. I shall start with the first two on the conservation of habitats and species. I have spent almost 30 years of my life campaigning for the nature directives—for their introduction, refinement and implementation, and, on occasion, in their defence. They have been hugely instrumental in protecting internationally important species and habitats, so I say to the Minister: tread gently because you tread on my dreams.

I am delighted that the Government accepted many of the concerns of the NGOs and others, and withdrew and then relaid the first statutory instrument. I commend the excellent work of Greener UK and its constituent NGOs in that respect. The SIs are certainly in better shape now, but there remain a number of points on which I seek ministerial assurance.

We welcome the new provision for statutory guidance to be produced in consultation with the appropriate nature conservation body. This guidance will be required urgently to ensure clarity across all sectors on the meaning of all these changes. I hope the Minister can assure the Committee that consultation on the statutory guidance will begin right away and not take more than a few months to conclude.

We welcome the new regulation introducing management objectives for special protection areas and special areas of conservation, and for their joint network, but I must admit that I am rather perturbed at the wording of the first SAC objective, which talks about achieving,

“a favourable conservation status … (so far as it lies in the United Kingdom’s territory, and so far as is proportionate)”.

This proportionality is about the management of sites, not their designation, and seems to introduce a new restriction that is not in the habitats directive—which, of course, I read nightly before I go to bed. The Minister kindly organised a briefing session with his civil servants, where it emerged that this was about prioritisation, and we explored on what basis that prioritisation process would take place. Surely if a site has been designated as being of international importance, the objective of achieving favourable conservation status ought to be axiomatic; we do not designate sites in order to watch them get worse. We may have only a small proportion of a particular European habitat and species, but we should still have a responsibility to get it into favourable conservation status. Equally, if we are the principal guardian of a habitat such as blanket bog or a species such as the great crested newt, we have a particular responsibility on behalf of the European biosphere to do a good job in looking after them. Do the Government think we have too many newts and blanket bog sites? I may be misjudging the Government, and I would be grateful if the Minister could explain what is intended by the concept that management effort should be “proportionate”.

I turn to reporting, which has been raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter. We welcome the change to the instrument, which brings in a requirement for reporting on progress, and on exceptions and derogations, but, as the noble Baroness said, the regulations do not make provision for anyone to review these reports or highlight any lack of progress, as is currently undertaken by the European Commission. As it stands, the statutory instrument is a diminution in protection for these vital species, sites and habitats. Although the reports will be forwarded to the Berne convention, the convention has not exactly been alacritous in following up failings and enabling action to be taken.

I ask the Minister to ensure that provisions be made for an independent review to be included, with the stress on the word “independent”. This would preferably have been in the legislation but we are now beyond that point, so can the Minister assure the Committee that a suitable independent body such as the OEP will be given this reviewing role? Although the progress in setting up the OEP is slightly glacial, the first report under these provisions is not due for two years, so I hope it would be set up in time to pick up the reviewing function.

The regulations introduce a new power for the relevant authorities to make changes to the birds and habitats directives’ annexes and the habitat regulations’ schedules, which will include prohibited methods of capturing and killing mammals and fish. Changes would be allowed on the basis only of technical and scientific progress. I echo the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, that expert input, and a duty to consult relevant statutory nature conservation advisers and take account of their advice, is needed in connection with this change, particularly since the changes would be achieved through negative procedure SIs, with their inflexibility to challenge once laid. It would be useful if the Minister could say whether the guidance that will be issued for this SI will confirm the process by which the Government will seek expert input, including from the statutory advisers, and whether this process will be agreed with the devolved Administrations.

On the amendment to Regulation 36, to move the paragraphs on prohibited means of killing mammals and fish into a schedule that would then be amendable by Ministers, could the Minister confirm, firmly and unequivocally, that these powers will not be used to roll back animal welfare standards? I am not sure the Government understand what a hornets’ nest they are inviting in making it easier to challenge what has been quite a difficult process of changing this particular set of provisions about killing.

A highly important issue, which some may see as a bit of a sideshow, is the name of the network of sites designated under the nature directives—currently Natura 2000. I declare an interest, because about 25% of the sites in that network were designated under my chairmanship of English Nature, a piece of work of which I am immensely proud. We are talking about my children and I love them all.

The statutory instrument proposes that this network be called the national site network. This has problems on three counts. The first is practical: sites of special scientific interest are also known as national sites, since they are important for national and not European criteria. Also, planners across the country risk getting mightily confused, as there is already reference to national sites in the National Planning Policy Framework. These are different sites with different criteria.

The second issue is that several of the Natura 2000 sites in Northern Ireland span the border with the south. I have happy memories of driving along the border in the dark during the Troubles, in an RSPB Land Rover, which I hoped was clearly marked, trying to track down the last crekking corncrake in Northern Ireland. If we crash out on 29 March and have a hard border in Northern Ireland, presumably wildlife will have to wait at the border, in common with everyone else, but we certainly should not call these border sites national sites because they are clearly transnational. Also, “national” has a distinctly different meaning in Northern Ireland.

The third and most important reason for not calling the network of sites the national site network is that the one thing that distinguishes the sites designated under the nature directives is that they are not national in importance, but designated for the very reason that they are international in importance. Therefore, could I persuade the Minister to confirm that no matter what this statutory instrument calls the network, the Government will swiftly announce that for the purposes of clarity it will forthwith be known as the international site network? This network would include the Ramsar sites to complete the set, and would be clearly distinguishable from the SSSIs and the marine conservation zones.

On the impact of the statutory instruments on provisions in Northern Ireland, the office for environmental protection will not operate in Northern Ireland. Northern Ireland is also the only country in the UK that does not have an independent nature conservation advisory body, so who will take an independent role in overseeing the implementation of these statutory instruments in Northern Ireland? For example, when I spoke on the need for reports to be reviewed by an independent body or for independent conservation advice to be taken, it was not clear who could take this role in Northern Ireland. We are sweeping away the powers that the European Union had in ensuring protections were enforced, but we are not proposing anything to replace that vital function in Northern Ireland. In the absence of a functioning Northern Ireland Assembly and Executive, what do the Government propose?

I see from the scrutiny of these statutory instruments in the other place that the Minister indicated that DAERA civil servants had asked that the possibility of the OEP covering Northern Ireland should be kept in play until Northern Ireland Ministers returned and could decide. Can the Minister cast more light on this? I hope he will confirm that these are issues that need to be tackled and tell us what discussions have been held on this with Northern Ireland civil servants. I hope the Minister will also agree that continued environmental co-operation on the island of Ireland will be vital post Brexit, since it is, after all, a single biogeographic unit.

Higher Education and Research Bill

Debate between Baroness Young of Old Scone and Lord Krebs

Report: 3rd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 13th March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as chancellor of Cranfield University, a truly global university in science and technology, with almost two-thirds of its students coming from outside of the UK. In looking at the Government’s Green Paper on industrial strategy, it is clear that what we want to try to forge for a post-Brexit UK is a vibrant industrial sector that is truly multinational in its businesses. That depends on being truly global in our approach to research and in recruiting the best and brightest students from across the world.

I know that we are in a particularly overheated moment in terms of immigration, and the Government are quite understandably nervous as a kitten in that respect. However, the reality is that we cannot regard international students as people who are coming here as supplicants to us. We are going as supplicants to them, because they have many choices. What international students want is to go somewhere where they will be able to study as an undergraduate, and then potentially as a postgraduate, at the cutting edge of whatever their discipline is, where they feel that their families are welcome to come and stay with them because they might be here for many years, and where they have the opportunity of moving seamlessly into employment with a company or organisation that they might have had contact with during their university years. That is what they want, and that is what we are preventing from happening if we are not careful.

The signal has gone out that Britain is not open for business for international students, whether or not that is true. The time has come, after all of these reports from other committees saying that we should change this very important signal, for the Government to ponder on that. The reality is that we are not going to see any diminution in the heat and steam around immigration in the next few years: we are going to see it getting worse and worse as we exit from Europe. The time has now come to make sure that the by-product of that heat and steam is not that we failed to deliver for our high standards of education, our high standards of research or our place in the global business community.

[Lord Krebs (CB)]

My Lords, in supporting Amendment 150 I declare an interest as having, for many years in the past, led a large research group at Oxford University that was heavily dependent on international students, not just from the European Union but from all over the world, from Argentina to the far eastern corner of what was then the Soviet Union.

I want in particular to refer back to one of the many Select Committee reports. The noble Baroness, Lady Royall, referred to the fact that this whole question of overseas students has been examined in recent years by many Select Committees. One such committee was the Science and Technology Select Committee when I was the chair; in 2014 we produced a report on STEM students—science, technology, engineering and mathematics students—in relation to international students and immigration rules. In the summary of our report, we concluded:

“Above all, we are concerned that Government policy is contradictory. The Government are simultaneously committed to reducing net migration and attracting increasing numbers of international students”.


Echoing what my noble friend Lord Bilimoria said, certainly in 2014, the Government had a target of increasing international students by 15% to 20% over the next five years. We went on to say, as other noble Lords have said during this debate:

“This contradiction could be resolved if the Government removed students from the net migration figures”.


Will the Minister, in his reply, tell us whether he recognises this target that the Government certainly had two or three years ago? Does it still exist and, if so, does he recognise that government policy is currently contradictory?