Fisheries Bill [Lords]

Carla Lockhart Excerpts

Report stage & 3rd reading & 3rd reading: House of Commons & Report stage: House of Commons
Tuesday 13th October 2020 Commons Chamber

[Scott Mann]

Indeed.

I welcome the package of three consultations launched by DEFRA today. The first is on strengthening the economic link for English licensed fishing vessels, to help ensure economic benefits for many of our coastal communities, including plans for an increased landing requirement of up to 70%. That is very welcome news for many people in North Cornwall. The second consultation is on proposals for how the new fishing opportunities that the UK secures in negotiations will be split between Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland and England in a way that is fairer and much more profitable for fishing communities across our four nations. Finally, I congratulate the Department on its proposals for how England’s share of those new opportunities will be distributed across communities. I hope that we will see greater benefits for many of our coastal communities and our hard-working fishermen and fisherwomen.

Concerns have been raised over the past few weeks that the scallop wars we saw a couple of years back in the English channel seem to be resurfacing, with many of our boats being targeted by the French. There is concern in the fishing community in Cornwall that, as we get to the crunch point in negotiations, much of their gear might be towed off and dragged due to the realisation that, if we do not reach a deal, there might be challenges for some continental fishermen.

Finally—it would not be a fisheries debate if I did not mention it—I want to talk about recreational angling. I know that I probably bore the Minister when I talk about this, and I promise that I will not talk specifically about bluefin tuna, although the conversation we had with the shadow Secretary of State on that recently was very productive; I am hopeful that we might reach a point where we have a catch-and-release bluefin tuna fishery around the coast of the country. I am grateful for the work that DEFRA is doing with the Angling Trust on developing a vision statement for recreational angling in the UK. The Minister will know that I have an ambition to create a world-class fishery and wide recreational opportunity for fishing off the north Cornwall coast. I look forward to working with her on the vision statement. Can she confirm that the statement will include policies that further support the interests of the UK recreational sector?

It is a pleasure to be in the House on this historic night. I have heard on many doorsteps in North Cornwall that we need to repatriate our territorial fishing waters, which were slayed on the altar as we entered the European Union. It is a pleasure to be here this evening to give a green light to the great opportunities that are coming to coastal communities. I ask the Government to continue to be robust in the negotiations, and they will continue to have my full support.

[Carla Lockhart (Upper Bann) (DUP)]

Yesterday, in the debate on the Agriculture Bill, Members heralded a new dawn for UK farmers. Likewise, today, with this Bill, we see a new dawn for our fishing industry, breaking free from the over-regulation of Brussels.

In Northern Ireland, we have a resilient and innovative fleet. They see Brexit as an opportunity. Therefore, as we chart this new course, it is incumbent on our Government to ensure that the approach taken is not simply a mirror image of EU regulation. This Bill indicates that that will not be the case, which is welcome.

Like most MPs here today, I read the briefing from Greener UK, which highlighted the fact that 58% to 68% of fish stocks in UK waters are now at sustainable levels. That signals an improving trend and is good news. The sustainability principle is already at the core of our fisheries policy. There is no need to give it precedence over other pillars of UK fisheries policy.

The top-down command and control approach of the common fisheries policy has failed. The UK must resist the temptation to begin this new era by prescribing draconian solutions across the board, as represented by remote electronic monitoring. On 29 September, the Fisheries Minister in Northern Ireland, Edwin Poots MLA, told the Assembly that

“it is important that we have that devolved flexibility to choose from the range of management tools and measures, and pick those that are best suited to our fleet.”

I agree with our devolved Minister because I do not support the amendment that would see REM prescribed. Rather, REM should be something to be considered with the fishing community, rather than imposed upon them.

Our fishermen in Northern Ireland are custodians of the sea. The principle of sustainability is written into their DNA. I hope the EFRA Minister will acknowledge that, in recent years, the total allowable catch in ICES Area VIIa has been managed according to the principles of maximum sustainable yield. The ICES advice for 2021 indicates more challenges and opportunities in the area. In the main, these are within natural fluctuations, but there continues to be debate among fisheries scientists and fishermen around some of the stark figures.

Northern Ireland’s fishermen have worked with members of the Greener UK alliance to develop and agree proposals for marine protected areas in the Irish sea. It is no secret that these measures and other similar plans within Northern Ireland’s territorial waters are causing economic harm to local fishermen. Nevertheless, what this shows me is that legislation at a national and a devolved level does work to achieve our marine sustainability goals. I wish to hear from the Minister about what legislative route she intends to use to devolve responsibility to the authorities in Northern Ireland for the designation and management of marine protected areas throughout our maritime zone, as is the case with Scotland and Wales. Amendment 42 offers more power to Northern Ireland, and we welcome that, but we support more devolution of these powers to Northern Ireland, similar to that in Scotland and Wales.

The Public Bill Committee reviewing this Bill did not have any representative from Northern Ireland. The written evidence submitted by the Northern Ireland industry, specifically by Alan McCulla from the Anglo-North Irish Fish Producers Organisation, referred to the marine protected area process, as well as the discrimination faced by all UK fishermen in the Irish sea, especially those from Northern Ireland because of the application of the Hague preference. We presume that, come 1 January 2021, this discrimination will end when the rightful share of annual total allowable catches is repatriated to the UK. That will then be shared among UK fishermen.

I want to make it very clear here that, within the UK, Northern Ireland fishermen expect nothing more than their share of the UK’s old and new fishing opportunities across all waters and quota species, based on the methodology used today. Based on established international law, zonal attachment is the principle that this Government have used to claim an increased share of the available catches. Within the UK, the established principle of fixed quota allocations should be used to apportion any new quota.  It should then be left to the devolved Administrations to decide how to allocate that quota.

It is time to seize the opportunities that arise from our escape from the common fisheries policy and Government must ensure that that happens.

[Douglas Ross (Moray) (Con)]

I congratulate the hon. Member for Upper Bann (Carla Lockhart) on an excellent speech. She spoke on behalf of not just her constituency but fishermen across Northern Ireland. She put her case and their case across very well in the House tonight. I echo what my hon. Friend the Member for North Cornwall (Scott Mann) said. It is a pleasure and a privilege to be in the Chamber tonight, as we debate such an important piece of legislation for our own constituencies, the communities we represent, the whole of Scotland and the United Kingdom. They are looking to this Parliament to finally take back control over our fishing industry. It has for too long been dominated by decisions in Brussels, rather than here in our Parliament in the United Kingdom.

This is very much a framework Bill. It is supported by the Scottish Fishermen’s Federation and it allows us to do far more back here in the House of Commons or in the devolved Administrations. This legislation and the proposals put forward by this UK Conservative Government respect devolution. It looks for and enhances the sustainability in our seas, but also the sustainability in our fishing communities. For so long—decades—fishing communities in Moray such as Cullen, Findochty, Buckie and Burghead have suffered from a reduction in fishing right across the country through the straitjacket of the common fisheries policy. It has done so much harm to our industries, which were crucial to towns and villages right across the country. Many of those areas have been decimated, but now we can start to build back again: build back our fishing industry, our fleet, our crews and our catches, and what they mean to individual communities, what they meant decades ago, and what we can do to revitalise those areas when this industry gets back up and running because of the legislation that this UK Government and this Parliament are looking at, debating and taking through now.

Positive as I am about the Bill, I have to pause for a moment and stop that positivity to discuss the contribution from the hon. Member for Edinburgh North and Leith (Deidre Brock). [Interruption.] She laughs about her contribution. I wish I could laugh at it. I really wish I could find it funny. I watched part of her speech on the screens outwith the Chamber and, when I was able to come in, I listened to it further. Watching it on television I thought it was bad enough, and then I looked in. Sometimes we say things in the Chamber and we reflect, because we are not reading a pre-prepared, scripted speech, that maybe we could have said something different and put it a better way. I watched the end of the hon. Lady’s speech and she was reading it out. I thought, “What kind of individual sits at a computer and types such a bitter, twisted and misleading statement, reviews it”—I presume she writes it herself, but I cannot guarantee that—“and stands up in the Chamber of the House of Commons and reads out such a poorly crafted argument that does not represent what Scotland is looking for from this Bill and does not represent what fishing communities right around the country are looking for from this Bill?”

I do not believe the hon. Lady’s speech represents the Scottish National party position on this. If you listen to her, there is nothing good in the Bill being brought forward by this Government, but her own party in the Scottish Parliament has given a legislative consent motion for it. So just once I would ask her to look beyond her blinkered vision of separatism, assuming everything done in this UK Parliament is bad, and consider for a moment that the 1 million people in Scotland who backed Brexit and the almost 50% of voters in my Moray constituency who backed Brexit, might actually look at this as an opportunity—an opportunity for this UK Government to take control back from the European Union over fishing and devolve further to our devolved Administrations right across the country. She would do herself, her party and Scottish politics in general a service if she looked at that and that argument from a more positive angle just once—to look at the positivity, rather than always the negativity.