Fisheries Policy

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Thursday 3rd December 2015 Westminster Hall

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Nuttall. I congratulate the hon. Members for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray) and for South Down (Ms Ritchie) on securing this debate, and I endorse the view expressed by the right hon. Member for Tynemouth (Mr Campbell) that this subject really belongs in the main Chamber. The fishing industry matters for all our coastal and island communities and deserves that degree of respect. I hope it will receive it in years to come.

I echo the comments made by the hon. Member for South East Cornwall when she spoke of the current EU renegotiations as a missed opportunity to reopen discussions on the common fisheries policy. There was an opportunity for the Prime Minister to atone for the sins of his political ancestors, if I may put it that way, and it would be an eminently achievable objective, because I do not think the common fisheries policy, as it stands, has many friends, even in Brussels. We can all see the damage that it has done to our respective countries and industries. We have the opportunity to reboot it.

[Mrs Murray]

I praise the right hon. Gentleman for securing the earlier Westminster Hall debate on the common fisheries policy. Does he agree that it would send a message to the fishing industry that the Government care about fishermen and women?

[Mr Carmichael]

Indeed it would. For that reason, I intend to keep making the case, and I do not doubt that the hon. Lady will, too. This case is best made in this House, as is generally the case—I speak as a Member who represents a fishing community—to ensure it is made in the broadest possible way. By and large, there is not a great deal of difference between the parties on fisheries policy. We all face the same challenges in our communities. For that reason, it will be easy to build a cross-party consensus.

I want to dwell on two areas today. I understand—perhaps the Minister will deal with this in his remarks—that the EU-Norway negotiations are proceeding fairly well. It looks as though they will produce quota uplifts for most species, with a significant—and worrying for my constituency—exception for mackerel and blue whiting. That exception will be even more significant in the discussions that are about to start in Copenhagen between the European Union and the Faroe Islands. I hope the Minister will take that point away and pursue it vigorously with the EU negotiators in those discussions. There is grave concern in the pelagic industry about the way in which the 2014 deal between the EU and the Faroe Islands is being allowed to operate.

As hon. Members are doubtless aware, the deal was designed to allow EU vessels some access to Faroese waters. In return, Faroese vessels can catch a proportion of their mackerel and blue whiting in EU waters. The deal was met with substantial scepticism in my constituency and by the pelagic fleet in Shetland, in particular. They have gone along with it and have done their best to make it work, but with every week and month that passes it becomes more apparent that the deal requires urgent review.

The recent Seafish study shows that this year the Faroese have overcaught their entitlement of mackerel by 1,400 tonnes, but there have been no boats catching mackerel or blue whiting in the Faroese waters. Surely, it is possible to do this without threatening the access of EU vessels to Faroese waters. Essentially, the Faroese were given an inch in 2014, since which time they have taken a mile. The deal looks more and more unbalanced with every day that passes. It requires urgent attention from Britain and the EU.

The other matter that I wish to bring to the attention of the Minister and of those in the devolved Administrations, because it is of significance to them, is the implementation of the demersal discard ban, which is due to come into force at the beginning of the year. We always knew that the demersal ban would be tricky.

[Mr Angus Brendan MacNeil (Na h-Eileanan an Iar) (SNP)]

The right hon. Gentleman probably has the same concerns as I do about the lack of port infrastructure for the discard ban, which will affect some boats. Has he encountered that issue in Orkney and Shetland?

[Mr Carmichael]

It is very much an issue that we have encountered, especially in Shetland. The real difficulty is that until we have the discard ban, we will not know exactly what we are dealing with, in terms of stocks and the infrastructure that will be needed. However, all the indications are that it will be substantial. The Government have a role, because the way in which the discard ban is implemented is down to the Scottish Government, the UK Government and the other devolved Administrations. I say to the Minister, as I say to others, that there is a real need for much greater flexibility, especially in the early years, until we see exactly what we are dealing with and how it will work.

[Mr MacNeil]

I have two boats—the Aquarius and the Cheerfull—in Barra. They are not very cheerful at the moment, because the discard ban is coming into force on 1 January—in four weeks’ time—and the main port they are landing in does not have the infrastructure.

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[Mr Carmichael]

I would be astonished if they are landing on 1 January.

[Mr MacNeil]

So would they.

[Mr Carmichael]

But no doubt issues will come down the track shortly thereafter. Flexibility in the implementation is needed. The indication is that the approach of the fisheries departments in Edinburgh and elsewhere is too prescriptive and does not allow the flexibility that is needed.

I bring to the House’s attention the recent report from Seafish entitled “Landing Obligation Economic Impact Assessment, Interim Report Two”—a snappy title—from August. I will read it into the record, because it should concern every representative of a fishing community. It states:

“Even considering the benefit of the most generously defined policy levers”—

that is, flexibilities and exemptions—

“the analysis shows that a significant volume and value of quota could remain uncaught as a result of the landing obligation.”

The worst-case scenario is that,

“In 2019...the fleet segments in Scotland would catch and land 51% (£99.9 million) of the value”

of the total allowable catch. Essentially, that would leave 49% of the catch unaccounted for, uncaught and unlanded. No fishing fleet can cope with a cut of that significance. That is the worst-case scenario and worst-case scenarios need not happen, but it is a warning. That is what the Scottish fishing fleets face at the moment. Unless we have the necessary flexibility, something that was brought in with good intentions could have serious and profound unintended consequences.

I hope that Ministers here and elsewhere will heed these warnings and act on them. It comes down to a basic principle that we have spoken about over the years: when it comes to fisheries management, the people who need to be listened to first are the fishermen. We will be watching to see whether the Minister and his counterpart in Edinburgh, Richard Lochhead, are prepared to do that. It will be obvious to all if they are not.

[Craig Mackinlay (South Thanet) (Con)]

I thank the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) for securing this debate.

[Mr Carmichael]

I didn’t.

[Craig Mackinlay]

I apologise. I thank the hon. Member for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray) for opening the debate. Once again, all Members will congratulate the House of Commons Library on its excellent publication.

The Prime Minister recently wrote a letter setting out the areas in which he is seeking to reform our membership of the European Union. The second of the four areas in what everyone is now calling the Tusk letter is competitiveness. In that section, he called for a target to cut the total burden on business and he sought to boost the competiveness and productivity of the European Union and drive growth and jobs for all—all very good, laudable aims. However, he missed the opportunity to raise the question of the damaging common fisheries policy and, for that matter, the common agricultural policy.

Later in that letter, the Prime Minister highlighted the fact that the United Kingdom is the European Union’s second-largest economy and the fifth biggest in the world. He could also have noted that, until relatively recently, Britain had claims to 80% of Europe’s fishing waters and that, in some estimates, British waters enclose up to 80% of western Europe’s fish.

It cannot be underestimated how wrong it is that, despite all the reforms of the CFP—every 10 years we have a new cycle of reforms—43% of the UK’s quota is bought by foreign-owned vessels. The UK was allocated just 30% of the EU quota for fishing ground stocks that occur in UK waters. The United Nations convention mentioned by my hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall states that the usual limit is 200 miles or the median line, but our membership of the EU has reduced those rights to just 12 miles.

I am here to discuss the problems in my constituency, where Ramsgate is the focus for local fishermen. In 2013, those fishermen implemented a pilot community quota group that provided 26% more quota to small boat—under 10 metres—fishermen and helped to reduce discards. It was deemed a great success by DEFRA at the time, but it has not been taken any further. Failing the extension of such local measures, which are in the Minister’s sphere of influence, local fishermen with whom I have spoken feel that we sincerely need to re-establish the principle of British fishermen in British waters.

Reports suggest that two thirds of the seafood consumed in Britain is now imported. Although that partly represents our evolving tastes and demand, it is also about supply. Last year, imports of fish and fish preparations fell by 3% to 721,000 tonnes, while exports increased by 10% to 499,000 tonnes. The main imports were cod, tuna, shrimp and prawns, and the main exports were salmon, mackerel and herring. By and large, we export what we catch and import what we eat. If we had a fairer share of the fish in the seas around this island nation, once described as an island of coal surrounded by a sea of fish, we would surely be a net exporter, not a net importer.

Over 78% of vessels in the UK fishing fleet are under 10 metres, such as those that operate out of Ramsgate and other ports in the constituencies of Members around the room. Shellfish is increasing in importance in the catch of those vessels, now representing 80%. The increase in relatively high-value shellfish catches has arisen because there is little else for boats to do, Ramsgate has seen a particular increase in whelks. The more than fivefold growth in shellfish landings since 1960 is explained by much, if not all, shellfish being outside of quota stocks.

The fish in our own seas are no more of a common resource to which all members of the EU should have equal and free access than the sunshine enjoyed by member states in the Mediterranean. If we really want to boost competitiveness, as so well described in the Tusk letter, and to drive our need for growth and jobs for all, we need to take back responsibility for managing our own fishing fleets and conserving our own fish stocks, but that is perhaps wishful thinking. Let’s get back down to brass tacks: we are where we currently are.

The brass tacks in Ramsgate are that we now have just 25 under-10 metre vessels, representing just 20 full-time employees and a landed value of just £1.5 million. With the value added in other local jobs, we can perhaps double the employment figure and the value to the local economy. The under-10s fleet is environmentally sustainable and well supported by organisations such as Greenpeace, which currently has legal action under way. The vessels have a low impact on local stocks and provide a greater opportunity for local job creation than industrial fishing. Article 17 of the common fisheries policy includes the right to earn a living, but that right is simply fantasy in Ramsgate. The article also allows Ministers to devise mechanisms to ensure that distributions to coastal and inshore fishermen are right and fair, and the modern CFP is meant to incentivise sustainable fishing that benefits local coastal economies.

My fishing community faces problems on four fronts. First, members will be aware of the massive expansion in offshore wind in that part of Kent and the substantial dredging for operations in London. It would be fair to say that fishermen in Ramsgate are operating in a new building site, which causes them particular problems.

Secondly, the six-month precautionary ban on bass that is proposed by the European Commission for January to June next year will be simply devastating.

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[Dr Eilidh Whiteford (Banff and Buchan) (SNP)]

We have had an extremely wide-ranging debate this afternoon. Several Members have opened their remarks by paying tribute to our coastguards, and to the work of the RNLI and the Fishermen’s Mission. I echo that and express my thanks to the men and women who crew our lifeboats in Fraserburgh, Peterhead and Macduff in my constituency. They are volunteers who risk their lives in all weathers to keep others safe. I thank many more besides, who work onshore for the wellbeing and welfare of our fishing communities.

I take a keen interest in this debate every year, as an MP representing two of the three largest fishing ports in the UK—Peterhead and Fraserburgh—and some of Europe’s most fishing-dependent communities, and given the crucial importance of the annual December talks not only to the fishing industry, but to the onshore processors, retailers and suppliers that depend on it. I am disappointed, therefore, like the right hon. Member for Tynemouth (Mr Campbell), that we find ourselves here in Westminster Hall once again debating this crucial industry in Back-Bench time, rather than in the main Chamber. Nevertheless, I am grateful to the Backbench Business Committee for allocating this time. I particularly thank the hon. Member for South Down (Ms Ritchie) for securing the debate.

[Mr Alistair Carmichael]

I just want to place it on the record that the main Chamber has now been adjourned for quite some time. With a bit of efficient business management, we could have been in there.

[Dr Whiteford]

I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for that helpful point, which I hope is noted across the House.

For the Scottish fleet, this year the EU-Norway negotiations are at least as important as the December Council—arguably more so—and they are going on as we speak. There are science-based recommendations for substantial increases in some of our most important jointly managed stocks, including cod, haddock, herring and plaice, which offer substantial reward to our fleet for their conservation efforts. We need to work towards a fair and balanced exchange with Norway that takes account of our present and future needs.

The right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael), the hon. Member for Totnes (Dr Wollaston) and my hon. Friend the Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (Calum Kerr), among others, talked about the implementation of the discard ban. Members will know that in previous years that has been the key focus of our fisheries debates, particularly the challenges of making a discard ban workable in a mixed fishery when there is a strong likelihood that vessels will pick up by-catch of species for which they do not hold enough quota. That issue has not gone away. Indeed, it is one of the reasons that such a lot is at stake in the Norwegian talks. It is extremely important that we do not trade away stocks now that could become “choke” species in the next few years as the landing obligation is phased in for jointly managed stocks. The Government need to think ahead about the longer-term challenge. I hope the Minister takes that point on board.

On the wider issue of discards, it is important to reiterate that, for the Scottish fleet, discarding has not just stabilised over the past few years, but in many fisheries has actively substantially reduced as a result of conservation measures. I am glad that the practical concerns about the landing obligation in relation to the demersal fleet have been heard, and that it is being phased in gradually starting in January, but I am conscious of the need for ongoing flexibilities.

I hope the Minister can address the issues raised by the hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Melanie Onn) and clarify where the responsibility will rest for the disposal of unwanted, unmarketable fish landed under the discard ban. There has been some debate and confusion about that and it would be immensely helpful if the Minister would set out his interpretation of the regulations.

On the December Council, I am really quite surprised that no one has yet mentioned the ruling earlier this week of the European Court of Justice regarding the stand-off between the European Council on one hand, and the Commission and Parliament on the other. That has some implications for our fleet. It is critical that fishing does not, once again, become a political football in the turf war between those institutions any more than it has already.

When the Council took the entirely sensible and responsible decision a few years back to depart from the cod recovery plan and place a freeze on effort, they did so on conservation grounds and on the basis of sound scientific advice. The cod recovery plan was proving to be counterproductive, undermining its own environmental objectives and, at the same time, putting untold pressure on ordinary fishermen and communities. The decision to abandon the cod recovery plan has been wholly vindicated, regardless of the procedural issues it has raised, by the fact that we now have healthy cod stocks, and that the intended target has been achieved through an alternative approach. There is agreement from all the North sea EU member states that the cod recovery plan needs to be repealed before cod is brought into the landing obligation. I would welcome the Minister’s assurance that he will press for that as a priority. The bottom line is that there is no need for further effort cuts when cod stocks are recovering so strongly in the North sea.

There has been a fair bit of debate this afternoon about renegotiating the CFP, and I agree with the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland that the UK Government could make progress on that with better hope of a positive outcome than on many of their other demands. I would welcome the Minister’s assessment of his prospects for pushing CFP renegotiation up the political agenda over the next few weeks.

Common Fisheries Policy (Reform)

Alistair Carmichael Excerpts

Thursday 10th September 2015 Westminster Hall

[Mr Alistair Carmichael (Orkney and Shetland) (LD)]

I am slightly disappointed to see the Chamber thinning at the rate that it is, but I am resigned to it. This topic has not suffered from a lack of debate over the years, certainly not during my time in the House. As we can tell from the number of Members leaving the Chamber, this issue matters a lot to a small number of communities and to a smaller number of people in a wider range of communities. My constituency of Shetland, in particular, is one of those communities where it does matter a lot.

In 2014, we in Shetland alone landed in the region of 78,000 tonnes of fish or shellfish with a value of £76 million from local and visiting boats: 24% of all fish landed in Scotland in that year. In fact, the amount of fish landed in Shetland is greater than the amounts landed in ports in England, Wales and Northern Ireland combined. Some 30% of our local economic product comes from fishing or fish farming—the seafood industries taken as a whole. I tell hon. Members that so that they can understand. Talk about common fisheries policy reform can often be quite jargon-heavy and a little bit dry and academic, but for us, as a community, it is anything but that. The fishing industry defines us as a community and underpins just about everything else that happens within our community.

Indeed, across all sectors of the industry, more traditional models of boat ownership and operating exist in Shetland than in other parts of the country, from where they have perhaps disappeared. We retain fishing as a family industry, where generation after generation will want to go to sea and make their living as fishermen. That came home to me in 2002, as a fairly new Member of Parliament elected in 2001: we had the December Council result, which was probably one of the most difficult for the industry to manage that people can ever remember. The week before Christmas, when the House had gone into recess, I went home to Shetland and had to address a mass meeting of the local fishermen’s association in the mission in Lerwick. It was as bleak and grim a meeting as I have ever seen; a week before the end of the year, not knowing what was going to happen come 1 January, the rug had been pulled out from underneath these men’s feet and they had no idea how they were going to manage the deal that had been landed on them. No other industry would manage itself, or allow itself to be managed, in that way. It was in that 2002 deal that the seeds of reform were sown, and we have seen significant progress since then.

In 2000, before I was elected to Parliament, I attended a conference in north-east Scotland where Mike Park of the Scottish White Fish Producers Association was one of the speakers. He said that the further a skipper is from his home port, the less he cares about conservation of stocks. That has stuck with me ever since. I have always taken that as being the justification for regionalisation and bringing control of the industry back as close as possible to the communities most directly affected by it.

[Mrs Sheryll Murray (South East Cornwall) (Con)]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that what was said at that time has been borne out, given the plundering of tiny fish that the Spanish pursued after Spain’s accession?

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[Mr Carmichael]

That was very much the context of the day. My only rejoinder to Mr Park’s statement would have been that the same was also true of Ministers and officials: the further removed they were from the management of stocks, the easier it was for them to impose unworkable deals that caused an enormous range of difficulties in practical terms. I exempt the incumbent Minister from that; he has always demonstrated a tremendous willingness to engage with industry and has a good working understanding of it.

[Neil Parish (Tiverton and Honiton) (Con)]

Does the right hon. Gentleman agree that one of the great problems of the common fisheries policy is that even the regional organisations are too large? If local fishermen realise that if they conserve fish they can get them at another time, they are more likely to go along with the measures. The trouble with the common fisheries policy is that there are too many fishing, from too far and wide, who are really not concerned about conserving fish now—they know very well that, if they do, somebody else will get them before they do. That is one of the worst problems of the CFP.

[Mr Carmichael]

There is not much that I disagree with there. The essence of the problem that the hon. Gentleman highlights is that fisheries management is something done to the industry and to the communities affected, rather than being something that they feel they have any ownership of, or are able to influence. Although there have been an enormous number of problems with the regional advisory councils, they have been a source of enormous progress and benefit and are certainly infinitely preferable to what we had before they were established, when everything was done in Brussels with simply no opportunity to challenge it.

How we have been able to build partnerships between fishermen, conservationists and scientists, through the regional advisory structures, is exceptional. That has been taken on by various people. I commend the Minister’s predecessor, the hon. Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon), for the work he did in the lead-up to landing a reformed common fisheries policy, because that developed the first iteration of the regional advisory councils to the point where they might even become regional management councils. That is the first point that I would like the Minister to take on. The advisory councils themselves are best placed to author the next iteration of their development. With the history of joint working and the body of expertise within the councils, that could now be done to improve and speed up the present rate of change.

[Mrs Murray]

The right hon. Gentleman wants regional management councils. How would he do this under the current treaties and regulations? We are never going to get rid of the equal access to a common resource while other countries want access to our waters.

[Mr Carmichael]

One reason why I love being in debates with the hon. Lady is that she always anticipates my next point. That is exactly why I think this is a timely debate. However, before I touch on that, I should like to make a brief reference to one other aspect that hinders the work of the regional advisory councils and everybody else involved in fisheries conservation. The International Council for the Exploration of the Sea and all the scientists involved in it are required to use data that, by the time they are implemented, are about two years out of date. One of the biggest difficulties with our total allowable catch and quota system is that it will work only if it accurately reflects the amount of fish in the sea at any moment in time. For that reason, if the data are two years out of date, there will eventually be a difference between what fishermen are told is in the sea and what they actually find in their nets. That then results in a downward spiral, where the fishermen have no respect for what the scientists tell them, and the TACs and the quotas do not reflect what the fishermen find.

The problem will become particularly acute as we implement the next stage of the discards ban; it has always been difficult, but it is now positively urgent that we deal with it. There must be some way in which an early, quick and dirty analysis can be done so that the data can be used in as close to real time as possible.

The reason why I sought the debate, and why I am so pleased we have a good turnout, is the very point raised by the hon. Member for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray). I hope Members will forgive the pun, but we have been pushing water uphill a lot of the time in reforming fisheries management and the CFP. That is because of the constitutional architecture within which the CFP, in its various iterations, has had to sit: the various treaties, the acquis communautaire, the principle of common access, which the hon. Lady mentioned, and the Lisbon treaty, which enshrined the principle that the conservation of marine biological resources, as only the EU could call fishing, was to be a sole competence—something about which I felt so strongly that I resigned from my party’s Front Bench when the issue came to a vote.

We have had to live with all those matters, because it has been next to impossible to find our way around them. If we proceed piece by piece, we will reform neither the policy nor the constitutional architecture that sits around it. Now, however, we apparently have an opportunity to bring about reform. The Prime Minister has said that we are to have a referendum on a reformed European Union, and the issue before us is one of the areas of community policy and responsibility that is absolutely ripe for reform. The CFP has not worked for fishermen, fishing communities, conservationists or scientists, so this is surely the time to take a blank sheet of paper and say, “We can do this differently.”

When we talk about regionalisation and regional management, we should say, “Those can be written into any new or changed treaty.” When we talk about the principle of common access, we should be honest about the fact that it had its roots in the very earliest days of the community. It was perhaps understandable for a community of six nation states, but for a community of 28 member states—not just around the North sea, but stretching right across Europe, and including many that are actually landlocked—it makes no sense whatever.

I cannot see many people in Europe, beyond the confines of the Commission perhaps, wanting to argue against such reform. The CFP has badly served all the member states and all the various interests affected by it. It has affected particularly badly the communities that I and others in the Chamber represent. We now have an opportunity, and I suspect that the Government would find it rather easier to make progress and to deliver positive change in this area than they might in some of the others that the Prime Minister has listed as priorities.

My request to the Minister is a simple one. On behalf of the House and the various fishing communities represented here today, will he make the need for reform and for tackling historic anomalies that have caused so many problems in Europe a priority for negotiation with other member states? In that way, he could deliver a change that would make an enormous difference to the industry and to the communities we represent, which would serve us all better as a result.

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[Mr Carmichael]

This is the first occasion that I have participated in a debate with the hon. Lady. I am delighted that she is here as successor to Austin Mitchell, who took part in these debates for many years but in a very different manner.

On Norway, the sensible regional management of the North sea would involve the coastal states that are members of the EU and Norway. The point about the current EU architecture is that that is simply not possible. With a different constitutional architecture, there could be genuine regional management involving Norway and EU member states.

[Mr Charles Walker (in the Chair)]

Order. Before the hon. Lady answers, I just want to say that I will call the shadow Minister at 3.8 pm and there is one more speaker. I would like to get the SNP speaker in as well, but I will be calling the first Front-Bench spokesman at 3.8 pm.

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[The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (George Eustice)]

I congratulate the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr Carmichael) on securing this debate. I know that the fishing industry is of huge importance in his constituency. I welcomed the opportunity that I had last year to make the long journey to visit his constituency and meet industry representatives.

I will try to cover as many of the points raised by hon. Members as I can. However, I will first give my reflections on my job from the two years that I have been Fisheries Minister. The marine environment is incredibly complex. No man-made policy designed to manage it and deliver sustainable fisheries will ever be perfect. The science will never be perfect, and we will never be able to pick up every interaction between different elements of the marine environment. If we want sustainable fisheries, there is no alternative but to have some kind of catch limit on vessels and some kind of quota system. Whether we were in or out of the common fisheries policy, we would have that quota system, just as Norway, the Faroe Islands and other states pursue catch limits, and we would still have arguments with other countries about allocation of fish stocks and seek reciprocal access arrangements.

The right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland asked about forums for discussion with countries such as Norway and Iceland. Those forums exist. The coastal states meeting takes place each autumn, where we argue about, for example, the allocation of mackerel quotas in his part of the world. There is already an EU-Norway agreement that precedes the discussions at the December Council.

We should all pay tribute to the great work of my predecessor in this post, my hon. Friend the Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon), who I believe made some important breakthroughs on reform of the common fisheries policy. Unlike the negotiations on reform of the common agricultural policy, which were very difficult and where we made little progress, even I, a strong Eurosceptic, recognise that good progress was made on CFP reform.

Four key things were delivered. First, there was a legally binding commitment to fish sustainably—to fish at MSY by 2016 where possible, and everywhere by 2020. Secondly, there was the discipline of a discard ban to ban the shameful practice of discards. Thirdly, in order to help deliver the policy and make it a reality, there was the regionalisation of policy making, so that nation states multilaterally agreed between themselves how they should manage the waters in which they have a shared interest, with the role of the Commission reduced to simply rubber-stamping those agreements at the end. That is really important. Although it is sometimes difficult to get member states to reach those agreements, it forces them to work through their differences, and these are the countries that actually have an interest in an individual fishery.

The final important element in making the discard ban work, as a number of colleagues have alluded to, was the introduction of flexibilities in the quota system. Those flexibilities include the ability to bank and borrow quota from one year to the next, which has been extended, and an inter-species flexibility, so that if a fisherman runs out of quota for one species—say, haddock—he can count some of his cod quota against haddock within certain limits. There were exemptions involving survivability on certain flat fish, for instance, and a quota uplift to take account of the fact that fishermen are no longer discarding. The deal to the fishermen is, “Stop discarding the fish and we will increase your quota by the amount that we estimate has been discarded previously.”

We should also recognise that good progress has been made. Contrary to what the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) said, the most recent assessment shows that we now have 32 stocks being fished at MSY. That is up from 26 in 2014 and from only around 13, if we go back around a decade. That progress is starting to feed through into benefits for the fishing industry. In relation to the North sea, last year’s December Council was much easier, and there were recommendations for increases. In fact, in certain species, such as cod and haddock, there is a similar situation this year, so where we have shown restraint, we are starting to see benefits accruing to the fishing industry. I always try to get this point across to fishermen: “If you show restraint now and allow stocks to recover and achieve that maximum sustainable yield, you are safeguarding your own financial future, because you will have more fish tomorrow.”

We have made good progress with the regional groups. A number of people have mentioned the importance of getting the industry involved, and I confirm that there is an industry regional group. The regional groups have been successful in developing the discard plans, both for the pelagic species, which is now in place, and for the demersal landing obligation, which was submitted in May. Following on from that discard plan, we now have the multi-annual plan for management, for instance, of the Baltic area, and we will shortly be beginning work to take forward ideas for our own plan. Therefore, good progress has been made, and as we made clear in our manifesto, our primary objective during this Parliament is to ensure that we get the hard-won CFP reform properly implemented.

The right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland commented that some of the science is out of date, and it will not surprise him to learn that I hear that all the time from fishermen. The reality is that we always try to make sure that we have the most up-to-date science. At last year’s December Council, we brought scientific results that were collected during the month of November/December straight to the Council. ICES always tries to project trends, so when it publishes its advice for a particular Council, it is not as dated as people suggest, because it factors into that the ongoing trends. I sometimes hear fishermen say that it goes where the fish are; that it goes to the same part of the ocean each year when it does its surveys. That is true, but some kind of basic yardstick is needed, which is consistent from one year to the next, so there is a control. In addition to that, we put scientists on actual fishing vessels, so that they can see fishing activity and the stocks that fishermen are landing.

The right hon. Gentleman and a number of colleagues asked about the renegotiation and the Prime Minister’s plans to renegotiate our relationship with the EU. The Prime Minister probably would not thank me if, here in a Westminster Hall debate, I were to add something to his renegotiation list, but I will say that, in common with the CAP, we have regular reforms of the common fisheries policy. They happen every 10 years. The next one is due to commence around 2019 and to be implemented from 2022, so there is a natural timetable for the next reform of the CFP.

Although our focus now is on making the existing reform work, I can say that the next reform might look at a couple of areas—it is too early to say whether it will. The first is to move from the rather arbitrary single-stock quota system to something a bit broader that recognises that biomass would be a natural step forward from MSY—but that is difficult to achieve. The second is, as my hon. Friend the Member for Waveney (Peter Aldous) and a number of colleagues mentioned, to look at the issue of relative stability. The reference period for the quota system that we have was set between 1973 and 1978. It is undoubtedly dated. However, we should not enter that venture lightly, because many other countries would believe that they have a claim for more fisheries, and we always have to be cautious that we are not unlocking something that would leave our industry at a disadvantage. They were set in that way at that time to end disputes about who should have access to what.

[Mr Carmichael]

Will the Minister give way?

[George Eustice]

I will carry on, if I may. My hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray) gave us a very detailed history lesson, and I will not challenge her historical knowledge of these things. However, we should recognise, as the shadow Minister said, that fish stocks were in a really bad place in the 1930s. We had suffered overfishing. Although we hear now about the discard ban and how the common fisheries policy created that, the truth is that as long ago as 1942, George Orwell was complaining about the discarding of fish. The fish stocks were basically saved by the second world war. We then had a period of plenty for the fishing industry during the ’50s and ’60s, but we then needed to move on to a quota system.

Along with a number of other colleagues, my hon. Friend mentioned the issue of access. She is right that when we joined the EU there was equal access in the 12 to 200- mile, or median, line in our waters, but access to the six to 12-mile line was for countries that had access agreements prior to accession. It is also important to recognise that we have access to other European countries’ waters. If someone were to talk the French industry, they would find that it complains, usually to the fishing Minister, about British access to, for instance, the bay of Biscay and the baie de Seine, which is important to part of our fleet. We also have access to waters in Ireland, Germany and the Netherlands.

My hon. Friend the Member for Waveney made a very important point about the under-10s, which I recognise. We have consulted on top-slicing 25% of the quota uplift for stocks and allocating that to the under-10s, on the basis that at the moment, they have to discard quite a lot of the fish that they catch because they do not have enough quota. He is right that during the reference period in the late 1990s, there was patchy reporting, which means that the under-10s do not really have a fair deal at the moment. We have already taken on Mr Bumble, as he would have it, and we have had legal challenges with the producer organisations to realign some of the quota. We will be doing more on that as well.

The hon. Member for Great Grimsby (Melanie Onn) raised the issue of choke species, among other things. The flexibilities that we have in the common fisheries policy can, I believe—if deployed correctly—deal with those problems. We start by not having every species covered from year one with the discard ban, and with the key species that define the fishery. For instance, in Scotland, fishermen often cite hake. Hake does not define the fishery in the North sea, and it is a species that would be returned to later in that window, closer to 2020. However, I was pleased to meet her, along with my hon. Friend the Member for Cleethorpes (Martin Vickers) earlier, with representatives from fish processors in her constituency. I recognise its importance there.

The hon. Member for Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk (Calum Kerr) mentioned relations with the Scottish Government. We are fully engaged and work very closely with my opposite number, Richard Lochhead. He attends trilaterals with the Commission at December Council and we will be working closely together, leading up to that.

Finally, the shadow Minister asked lots of questions that I cannot answer in full now, but he also asked about the precautionary principle. Of all the countries in the European Union, the UK has the strongest history of relying on and arguing the science, so we do have a science-led approach to fisheries management.

[Mr Carmichael]

That was an impressive canter by the Minister through the issues raised in this debate. I have only one point that I want him to take away. I accept and welcome the progress that he has outlined in reform of the common fisheries policy. He has my support and the support of my family—well, my family certainly, but also my party. [Laughter.] He has our support in moving towards the next stage of CFP reform. The truth is that that strengthens, rather than weakens, the case for reforming the constitutional architecture on which the policy base sits. That is the architectural framework that really has to reflect the policy that we now have. There is an opportunity here and I do not think that the Government should be resistant. They could become heroes at the end of the day.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered reform of the Common Fisheries Policy.