Fisheries Bill (Fourth sitting)

Bill Grant Excerpts

Thursday 6th December 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Mike Hill (Hartlepool) (Lab)]

That was an interesting answer to the question I was going to ask. I was going to ask you to clarify the position that the only way to redistribute quota fairly, if I heard you right, is to break the hold of the larger fishers and bring fisheries back into public ownership. You suggested something like a seven-year notice on that, but what you were just talking about was a potential incremental progression towards that through redistribution of surplus tonnage. Were you right in the first instance that fisheries have to be brought back into public ownership for fairer redistribution, but have you also realised that there can be incremental changes to benefit new starters or the under-10s as we proceed?

Griffin Carpenter: That is a good question. Unfortunately, it is an awkward one with Brexit timing, because we are not sure if or when the additional quota will come online. One of the issues about not dealing with the fixed quota allocations is that right now it really does not matter to a small-scale fisher if there is a theoretical extra quota that may or may not come. The more important point is that, given the timeline right now, it will probably need to be incremental, where first we will deal with the additional quota, then we deal with the existing FQAs. But that requires in the fisheries legislation at the first available opportunity to give notice, because every year you delay is another year that you cannot do the reallocation that we propose. The Fisheries Bill is the right place to do that.

[Bill Grant (Ayr, Carrick and Cumnock) (Con)]

Q On the same theme, I have come across the theory of using days at sea. What are your thoughts on days at sea in relation to quotas? It is admirable that you suggest giving that time period of 14 years to reduce the larger quotas, to give a better share for the smaller vessels and under-10s. While the capacity for the last vessels is there, how do you see us increasing the capacity of the smaller vessels over that period of time, and attracting new people into the industry to absorb the redistribution of quotas?

Griffin Carpenter: There is lots going on there.

[The Chair]

You will have to be relatively quick because we are running short of time.

Griffin Carpenter: I will be as brief as possible. There is a number of reasons why young people are not getting into fishing. Let us just stick with one of the most obvious: it is expensive to get in and get that quota. The UK could have a system, through the quota reserve, where it is allocated for free on a loan. Denmark does that—it is called a fish fund—and you can get more detail there.

--- Later in debate ---

[Bill Grant]

Q Moving slightly off the Bill—I am sure the Chair will forgive me as it is connected to the environment—we see birds gathering to migrate across the globe, but we do not see the same movement of fish under the water. What sort of distance do the fish travel as they migrate from place to place? Environmentally, we believe that the temperature of the water is going to increase, so could that increase in temperature alter where the shoals of fish go? Is that going to affect the fishery?

Dr Carl O'Brien: The answer to the first part is that it is very species dependent. Species like North sea cod will live in the North sea, the eastern channel and the Skagerrak. They mix quite happily. Species like mackerel, blue whiting and Atlanto-Scandian herring travel over very large distances. Species like eels essentially travel around the globe, starting in the Sargasso sea. We have a lot of data that has been funded by DEFRA, and the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food in its previous role, from tagging things like bluefin tuna. We have a lot of data on migration, so we know roughly where fish are moving.

The issue of climate change has two aspects. One is that, as waters warm, you may see a movement of fish. We have seen northern hake move from the southern waters more northerly into the North sea, which is causing some of our fishermen a problem at the moment, with choke issues. The other aspect is that you may suddenly find species that you have never seen before. We are getting reports of cuttlefish, squid and even jellyfish down in the channel. We are aware, through questioning the public, that there is an Asian market for jellyfish, so perhaps some time in the future there will be a market for UK jellyfish. Who knows? We are looking at that as part of this process; we are not focused just on this year’s or next year’ fishing quotas. It is very much about where we might be in 50 or 100 years’ time.

[Brendan O'Hara]

Q I have a question about the discard prevention scheme: we have heard over the last couple of days from representatives from the fishing fleet itself, who think the system will not work, and from environmental groups, which think there is not enough information on how it will operate. Could you tell us how the scheme will be implemented? Given that both the environmental lobby and the fishing fleet have concerns, do you think we should put something in the Bill to make it absolutely clear how it will work?

Dr Carl O'Brien: I am a scientist, not a politician or a Minister, so I do not know how it will work. The thinking behind it is that, as we move towards fully implementing the landing obligation next year, there will be some serious issues with choke species, as the Minister mentioned. My understanding of the discard prevention charging scheme is that you have two options: you either have such a scheme or you tie vessels up. As soon as you have fished your quota, you can no longer go to sea because you will not have the ability to discard, which means you will not have the ability to land quota.

The discard prevention scheme is a way of saying to fishermen, “If you have good ideas for selectivity measures or ways of mitigating large amounts of discard and you want to use those measures, if you catch a small amount of over-quota catch, through this scheme you can be charged and incentivised to carry on fishing.” Where the scheme moves from being an incentive to being a penalty is that if you habitually overfish, there must be a point at which it is a penalty to you and you have to stop doing it. Clearly, you would have to manage quota in such a way that the system can cope with that bit of overfishing. But in principle, it is a good idea.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Sweeney]

Q That is great. It is encouraging. The Department for Work and Pensions defines fishing as an unskilled industry. What is your take on that view?

Dr Amy Pryor: That is nonsense. Our fishermen have survived all sorts of adversity throughout the years. They are a massively untapped skill resource. You can learn all sorts of skills through working in the fishing industry and not necessarily become a fisherman. You can also learn a lot of skills that are peripheral to the fisheries industry so that you are more agile as a fisherman. When you do not have a quota or you have run out of days, whatever system is in place, you can move into another sector like boat engineering or boat maintenance—all sorts of stuff. Just because they do not want to talk to you, and they might be secretive about what their skills are, does not mean they do not have a huge amount of skill.

Elaine Whyte: I would add that if you can do your accounts and write a scientific report in a gale force wind while at sea, you are a very skilled businessman. That is something we should think about. We have a gap at the moment in skills, and we possibly need to look at foreign workers. It is important, particularly for rural areas. I would look at things like the “become a fisherman” scheme in Denmark, and how they have managed to turn things around in their country and repopulate rural areas just by proactive marketing. We need to do that. They are very skilled.

[Bill Grant]

Q This question is for Elaine. You will notice from my accent that I am a west coaster. I am of an age where I have seen the demise of the fleets running from Stranraer way up through to Oban, and I would love to see that return. Do you think this Bill and other changes to the CFP, or the absence of the CFP, will give us an opportunity? Should we have better training to make that industry more skilled than people perceive it to be? Should we have courses to encourage young men and women to go to sea and secure the fish that we have in relative abundance?

Elaine Whyte: Yes, absolutely. There is a generational issue. We have missed a generation, but we can catch up. We should have young men coming out of places such as Glasgow, where there is a port 30 minutes away, and thinking, “Actually, I could go to sea.” That is something that we have to be proactive on with Government. But I think we need to look at what has gone wrong. We can look at somewhere such as Stornoway. Pre-1974, it was landing more than 85% of fin fish; it is now landing 1% of fin fish. That possibly has something to do with the EU; it possibly has something to do with domestic allocations as well, so we have to look at it in a holistic way and try to give men, and women, a reason to want to go into the job. Nobody wants to tail prawns on minimum wage forever; people want the opportunity to have their own boat and to progress.

[Bill Grant]

Q We should make the conditions and the financial rewards better and we could grow the industry in due course.

Elaine Whyte: Absolutely.

Dr Amy Pryor: I absolutely agree. The only thing I would add is that I think this is an opportunity to think about a more integrated approach to the way we do our training. I am talking about cross-sectoral training schemes and apprenticeships not only to spread the skills and highlight the fact that you can have multiple transferable skills, but to build relationships across sectors. We can build those better relationships between the different coastal sectors. To back that up, Sir John Armitt recommended this, as part of the Thames growth commission, as a way forward, because we are lacking skills in all our coastal and estuarine areas.

[Owen Smith]

Q We heard earlier from one of the big shellfish companies and we asked it about the impact of tariffs—potentially, 8% tariffs on shellfish. How would that impact on smaller producers?

Elaine Whyte: We are extremely worried about that and always have been. And apart from the tariffs, we are extremely concerned about disruption and action, possibly, by French and continental fishermen, who might not be too happy about us getting access. That could be just as big a problem as the tariffs, to be honest, so yes, we are very concerned.