Fisheries Bill (Third sitting)

Alan Brown Excerpts

Thursday 6th December 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Mr Paul Sweeney (Glasgow North East) (Lab/Co-op)]

Q I would like to ask about the legal implications of potentially redistributing quotas. What do you envisage the complexities of that might be? How can we address them as part of the process? What is your take on monopolistic activity in the fishing industry?

Rebecca Newsom: Greenpeace has taken independent legal advice on the issue. The conclusion was that, from a legal perspective, the Government and any other relevant national authorities can feel very confident in proceeding with this new approach to quota distribution. The prospects of a successful judicial review are very low, and the reasons for that are twofold. First, in the Brexit process, the proposed amendment is being put into a new Westminster Act of Parliament. As such, after we leave the EU, Parliament will be supreme and the law will have superiority to case law. Secondly, the 2012 legal case discussed on Tuesday concluded that while there may be some property rights attached to fixed quota allocations, those are not applicable if the quota has not been used. In any case, it is within the power of the Secretary of State to allocate as they see fit. Taken together, our conclusion is that such a measure would be clearly compatible with national and international law.

[Alan Brown (Kilmarnock and Loudoun) (SNP)]

Q Good morning, everybody. We have not discussed the fact that the Bill includes a proposal for a discard prevention scheme. Do you have a view as to whether the measures are transparent enough? What are the risks of doing that? Is it the right approach to avoiding discards?

Helen McLachlan: Discards are a major issue and we welcome the continued commitment to trying to minimise discards overall. Our view on the measures in the Bill is that it is not quite clear what consequences or unintended consequences might arise. We would like to see more effort being placed on being clear about what it is we are taking out of the water and how much we really do need to discard. Going back to electronic monitoring at sea, we need to get a clear case. What we are concerned about at the end of the day is what we are removing from our ocean systems and how we can account for that sustainably. I think we would like to see more focus on that, rather than penalties per se, particularly as we are not quite clear on the intended or unintended consequences at this point.

Debbie Crockard: Especially because the original intention of the landing obligation was to improve selectivity, to make fishing more sustainable and to reduce waste. If there are uncertainties and things that are not clear within the Bill, we need to ensure that the legislation is still trying to meet those initial intentions.

[Alan Brown]

Q Rebecca, if we go back to quotas and quota allocations, you are talking about wanting to see more transparency, environmental measures and social benefits. You spoke about public consultation developing that. What do you actually want to see on the face of the Bill? That is what we are looking at just now. How do we get those protections in the Bill?

Rebecca Newsom: In terms of the Bill, we are talking specifically about clause 20, which starts off as a transposition of article 17 of the CFP. We are suggesting that a few very small changes are made to that article essentially to remove historic catch levels as one of the determining factors for distributing quota and to prioritise environmental, social and local economic criteria instead. That would be the tangible, most important change on the face of the Bill. In terms of the follow-up process, the change in the Bill would set the principles and the legal framework for how quota should be distributed in the future, but it would then become the responsibility and powers of the relevant national authorities, including the devolved Administrations, to run their own public, transparent consultation process to determine exactly what those criteria are, how it works in practice and to implement it.

[The Chair]

We now have to conclude this session. I thank all the witnesses for attending; your evidence has been very helpful.

Examination of Witnesses

Andrew Brown, Andrew Pillar, Daniel Whittle and Mike Park gave evidence.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

Order.

Mike Park: Perhaps I can answer the question that the hon. Member posed. In Scotland, I chair a group called the Scottish Fisheries Sustainable Accreditation Group. That group focuses on ensuring that we build stocks up to sustainable levels and that our fishermen harvest stocks appropriately in terms of selectivity and other things. Once we reach a certain standard, we put them through the gold standard of the Marine Stewardship Council certification. The consumer is more concerned about whether she is buying a sustainably caught fish—quality fish—than she is about where it is filleted. By attaching that mark we ensure we give comfort to the consumer. I think that where it is filleted or whatever is a bit of a red herring—excuse the pun. At the end of the day, the consumer is focused on whether the fish comes from a sustainable source and whether it is of good quality. That is what we as an industry group actually ensure.

Andrew Pillar: One of the things that we would like to see strengthened is the recognition around labelling and for labelling to be consistent with the chain of custody and provenance—where a fish has been through its life cycle. That really is driven by point of landing. If something is British, that point of landing is key because you start to derive the value upstream and downstream in the chain of jobs dependent on that fish being produced.

Andrew Brown: I agree with what Mike said about accreditation. Macduff is working hard on accreditation for nephrops stocks and scallop stocks. That is important to us, and, post Brexit, accreditation and certification will become that much more important to guarantee the sustainability of our stocks.

[Alan Brown]

Andrew, you commented that access to EU markets and the EU workforce is critical for business and industry. What will the ending of free movement mean for your industry? Have you seen any impact of Brexit already since the referendum? Also, what are your views on future immigration policy? The UK Government are talking about not allowing what they call “low-skilled workers”, and having a £30,000 threshold for qualification.

[The Chair]

Order. I am advised that free movement is beyond the scope of the Bill.