Fisheries Bill (Fourth sitting)

Peter Aldous Excerpts

Thursday 6th December 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Luke Pollard]

Q You have the allocation of quota—who has the ability to fish—but the economic link is an important additional, complementary policy. I am especially concerned about those small communities around our coast for which fishing has historically been a very strong industry, but that strength has reduced over the course of our involvement in the CFP. Would requiring a national obligation to land at least 50% of your catch in any one quarter, but allocated on a species-by-species basis, make a difference? Where would the difference be most felt, in your opinion? Would it be in small communities or larger ones? How would it be distributed?

Griffin Carpenter: I guess the first point to make is that every trend or practice we see in the industry is there for a reason. I am sure you are aware of that, but we need to think, “Why are the landings not taking place in the UK right now?” The first reason is probably the price effect. If you can get a higher price elsewhere, you land it elsewhere. If we are going to change some of the incentives, or have a conditional policy such as the economic link, be aware that basically we are accepting a trade-off: fishers might not be as profitable in the catching sector because they are getting lower prices on first sale in the UK, but we may well make up for that later in the value chain. Just be aware that that is the trade-off you are accepting.

The idea of an economic link as a principle that the public resource should be landed in the UK is a valid economic one. I would go about designing the policy a bit differently. The economic link is very rigid; you are either above the line or below it, whether that is 50% of your landings or 60% or 70%. If you are already landing 90% of your catches in the UK, this policy does not really address you at all.

I would rather have a marginal incentive. For example, funding for fisheries management is not really talked about in the Fisheries Bill, although it is in the White Paper. That is fine, but let us think about it this way: if we are going to have a landings levy—in the same way that you might have a levy on stumpage fees in forestry—on aggregate extraction or on other resource industries, and if we are going to have the fishing sector pay for management, why not differentiate so that 1% of your landed value in the UK goes to resource management, but if you land abroad it is 3%? The idea is that there is a marginal incentive for every trip you make, rather than a threshold that, as far as I can see, would not affect most of the fishers who already land in the UK.

[Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con)]

Q Griffin, you have talked in quite a lot of detail about the reallocation of quota. From my perspective, representing a community that is a have-not, shall we say, that is music to my ears, but I am wary of the legal implications of that. I agree that fishing is a public right, but as we have heard in our evidence sessions, by ill fortune or bad management, it has acquired certain proprietorial rights. How far, legally, do you think we are able to go? The important thing is that this Fisheries Bill must be determined and made by this House, not by lawyers.

Griffin Carpenter: Absolutely. I am not a lawyer—I am an economist—but the legal advice I have heard is that the use of a notice period goes a long way. I mentioned the international examples. We have to make some claim on FQAs as a public resource. Where you might get buy-in for this across the whole sector, including the large-scale fleet, is on something such as flagged vessels. When you hear about Spanish vessels in UK waters, they are almost never Spanish vessels in the sense that they have a Spanish flag and are fishing the Spanish quota; they have purchased UK fishing vessels and are fishing with UK quota, and a lot of coastal communities do not like that. For example, in Wales, most of the quota is caught by those vessels and either landed in Ireland or taken straight to Spain.

The problem is that, if you want to address this issue of flagged vessels—those who are foreign nationals but have UK quota—you must do so by saying, “FQAs are a public resource and we are going to take that away from you and then revisit the issue of distribution.” In a political sense, you can get buy-in for that idea. In a legal sense, I get that the notice period goes a long way. We heard the point made this morning that, because this is new legislation, some of the case law around the previous FQA distribution under the common fisheries policy might not apply. I am actually not sure about that.

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

Q Sticking to the quota theme, you have already touched on the debate between this being enabling legislation and how much detail needs to be in the Bill. Do you think there needs to be more on how the quota allocation will work in future? You also mentioned potential quota reserves for new entrants—small-scale recreational anglers have also been mentioned—so is it your view that there should be more in the Bill?

Griffin Carpenter: I think that is a political question. I understand the idea that it is enabling legislation and that for most fisheries legislation all the detail will come in secondary legislation, but if you have some priorities that you absolutely want to ensure are in future UK fisheries, here is an opportunity to introduce them. I understand that some of the ideas we are discussing might be incongruous with the tone, at least, of the rest of the Bill, but here is an opportunity where we can say, “Starting now, we are only in 2018 and we are already thinking about this issue. We are guaranteeing it is in the fisheries legislation, first and foremost.” From a political perspective, that is valid.

--- Later in debate ---

[Brendan O'Hara (Argyll and Bute) (SNP)]

Q Your report, “A Fair and Sustainable Fisheries Bill”, made a number of recommendations. How much of that has been translated into what we have in front of us? Do you think that the Fisheries Bill represents radical change or preservation of the status quo? Is it a missed opportunity?

Griffin Carpenter: It has been discussed many times that it is an enabling piece of legislation. Many of our policy ideas are not in there, for the reasons just discussed. In my opinion it is a political choice whether you get overly detailed in one area. That is a trade-off, depending on what you want to prioritise now and your trust that it will come in secondary legislation.

We were calling for redistribution of quota. Something I think is missing from the Bill, which was discussed earlier, is commitments to maximum sustainable yield—not just the stock commitment but the flow, so how much you are taking out. Many of us were surprised that was not in the Bill. We would like more focus on inshore fisheries management; those are shellfish stocks that are left out of the discussion on quota.

Also, there is a lack of trust in the fishing industry. The way you build trust is through repeated social interaction. The only realistic way to do that is to have inshore bodies, where all the stakeholders meet together to discuss issues in the inshore waters within 12 miles. Those bodies should be empowered to have jurisdiction up to 12 miles and control the number of pots, and so on.

[Peter Aldous]

Q The right hon. Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon), when he was Fisheries Minister, fought very hard in the 2015 review of the CFP, and the general consensus was that it was a good deal. One of the main things won was article 17, so you worry me by basically saying that no one takes any notice of it. In transposing article 17 to the Bill, what can we do to give it teeth, so that people take notice of it and it is implemented?

Griffin Carpenter: Exactly. This refers back to the first discussion we had. We as an organisation were one of the groups advocating for article 17 in the CFP. The CFP—people might disagree with this—actually gives quite a lot of power to member states, for better or worse. The EU did not want to say exactly how each member state should allocate its fishing opportunities. It just says, “Tell us how you are doing it. Be transparent and objective about how you are doing it. Is it based on historical catch records? Are you giving more to the small-scale fleet?” and so on. Every member state continued allocating quota as they were. The UK has done some things with unused quota, but never actually referred back to article 17. It was just that the small scale wanted more, so they gave some more.

The problem with transposing that is that it seems like we are missing an opportunity to be specific. Article 17 was vague so that each member state could use their own criteria. Now we are transposing that, but we are the member state—we are one entity—so we can say exactly, especially in the case of England, how we are going to do it, and we can say that right now. It seems strange to transpose something that was intentionally vague so each member state could be specific.

[Owen Smith (Pontypridd) (Lab)]

Q As a Welshman, I am obviously worried about the prospect of robbing Dai to pay Pedro. On the issue of flagged vessels that you mentioned, is there anything in the Bill that would stop the Welsh from addressing that issue?

Griffin Carpenter: Nothing that stops the Welsh from addressing the issue, but nothing that addresses the issue per se. Again, devolution is extremely awkward in fisheries, where we have a Bill that empowers the fisheries Administrations and stops there. It would be up to the Welsh Government to do something, presumably in their licensing.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

Three more Members have indicated they want to ask a question, and I want to try to get them in before 3 o’clock.

[Peter Aldous]

Q Good science and evidence should underpin sustainable fishing, yet at the moment electric pulse fishing is going on in the southern North sea. How can we devise a new framework that stops such practices and ensures that we pursue a precautionary approach to sustainable fisheries management?

Dr Carl O'Brien: The short answer to that is that DEFRA is funding a project that my colleagues in CEFAS in Lowestoft are undertaking to collect more evidence on the detrimental effects of pulse trawling. It has to be evidence-based. The industry is polarised. There are those who hate it just because they hate it and there are those who have a slightly open mind. The scientific evidence is not conclusive that pulse trawling is bad. There are clearly environmental benefits from it. It certainly reduces fuel consumption and the impact on the seabed, but there are some side effects. Species such as cod and haddock can be damaged by the pulse trawlers.

[Peter Aldous]

Q Before the Dutch built a whole new industry on the back of this, should the science not have come to a conclusion as to whether it was a good thing or not?

Dr Carl O'Brien: It came to a conclusion that there was not a conclusion. ICES held a number of working groups that reviewed the evidence. It was not conclusive that pulse trawling is detrimental because there are positive benefits from having a pulse trawl. There is anecdotal information from our own industry that at certain times of year, you find cod with broken backs. That is certainly so for the Thames estuary, and it could be the impact of pulse trawling. Talking to some of the food producers who deal with chickens, one of the reasons for not electrocuting chickens is that you break their backs when they go into spasms. That is exactly what would happen to a cod; it would also break its own back.

I think the answer to your question is that until you actually have the evidence and it is conclusive that you should ban a method, it is quite difficult to ban it. The Commission has gone out of its way to allow scientists to collect the evidence. The slightly surprising thing is that I was around when ICES gave its original advice, which was for 10 or 12 vessels as a scientific trial. It is now about 100 vessels, and that clearly is not a scientific trial. I think you have to be very clear about the parameters when you give dispensations for gears.

[Peter Aldous]

Q So the new UK fishing policy can be better than the CFP when it comes to sustainable fisheries management.

Dr Carl O'Brien: I think so. I have forgotten who asked me the question earlier, but if you are going to allow vessels to come into our exclusive economic zone, we can put conditions on their access rights. If we decide we do not like pulse trawling and we have our own evidence base to say that, I assume we can just say, although it would not necessarily ban it, that any vessel with pulse cannot come in.

[Owen Smith]

Q Dr O’Brien, given your long experience of going to Council, how do you envisage our country being treated during the transition period, when we will effectively have observer status?

Dr Carl O'Brien: I do not know, because I am under the impression that this is my last December Council, as it is for the Minister, unless I have been misinformed.

--- Later in debate ---

[Luke Pollard]

Q In terms of supporting small fleets, which generally speaking are the ones that have the potential to have the biggest impact as quickly as possible in coastal communities, what measures do you feel we need to ensure are in the Bill to support the small fleet in particular?

Dr Amy Pryor: It depends on what you call the small fleet; I prefer to call it a coastal fleet. Again, I would say that you should look at what Norway has—their coastal fleet is 5 metres up to 30 metres. I think the definition can be quite wide. We have mobile guides and keel guides. We have to be just a bit more flexible about opportunities. It is about ensuring that we have the quota and licences available and that we are providing grants to get new starts into the market and giving them a leg up.

Dr Amy Pryor: I agree with all of that. I also second what NEF said about using transparent and objective criteria in quota allocation so that you really do start to recognise the sustainability credentials of the small-scale inshore fleet; it is common sense that they are much more sustainable by being local and non-nomadic and using smaller vessels. Seafarers UK is very concerned, though, that that can lead to a lack of safety at sea, where individual fishermen are piling as much gear as possible on to tiny vessels and souping up the engines, which is highly dangerous. It is about finding a balance between keeping fisherman safe and having a fairer distribution of quotas.

[Peter Aldous]

Q You referred to the need for co-ordination between marine and land-based planning. Would you say that the same would apply for economic regeneration and a role for local enterprise partnerships?

Dr Amy Pryor: Gosh, absolutely. In the last year or two, some LEPs with coastal areas—in fact, most have them—are starting to look towards the coastal communities, but it certainly has not been that way since the beginning. It was a fight to get them to take notice of the coastal areas and the role that they play. I see a role for LEPs and for coastal partnerships, because they have a lot of trust from the local community and have been around for about 20 years; they pool all the different strengths together. I would like to see more formal recognition in the Bill—perhaps an extra marine planning objective that could actually set out these things. The Fisheries Bill cannot remedy everything, but it could take steps towards providing that integration, which would also achieve the objectives of the 25-year environment plan that the Government are committed to.

Elaine Whyte: To be fair, it is not just in marine planning, but in science. We always find that the science is lacking at local inshore levels. Again, we should be looking to Norway and at our local fleets as reference fleets and get the fishermen working with the scientists to provide that reflexive data that is needed. A lot of planners and other people sitting around the table do not quite understand what is happening. There is a major problem there for stakeholders as well. What we do have around these timetables are a lot of stakeholders; we are very happy to have them, but sometimes they bring their own science and ideologies. What we really need is an honest broker—that is how we can do it through marine planning and through local authorities.

[Brendan O'Hara]

Q This is more to Elaine. Clause 10 is about the power to grant licences. Scottish Ministers and Northern Ireland Departments can do it. The Scottish west coast fishing fleet is in close proximity to Northern Ireland; they fish in the same water for the same stocks. How concerned are you and your members about the possibility of different regulatory frameworks for Scotland and Northern Ireland, and what damage could that do to the west of Scotland fleet?

Elaine Whyte: With the greatest respect to Northern Irish colleagues, who we have fished with for a long time and whom we respect entirely, we are concerned about this, because it is the same stock from the same area. If there are different tariffs and different rules applicable, that will of course impact on our trade and our entire ability to fish. It is a massive concern.