World Oceans Day 2021

Peter Aldous Excerpts

Tuesday 8th June 2021 Westminster Hall

[Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr Hosie, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for North Devon (Selaine Saxby) on having the foresight to secure this important debate on World Oceans Day. Although the world’s oceans are an enormous stage, they are all interconnected. Whatever happens in one place can have global implications. If someone somewhere gets it wrong and manages a particular fishery or coastline irresponsibly and recklessly, everyone can suffer, but if we get it right somewhere, in however small a way, there is the potential to spread benefits, opportunities and good practice around the world.

My apologies, Mr Hosie, but I am going to be parochial, in that the focus of much of what I will say is on, in or off my own backyard—the UK waters of the East Anglian coast. In October 2019, the East Anglian fishing industry came together with local councils, Seafish and the New Anglia local enterprise partnership to produce the Renaissance of the East Anglian Fisheries report. With Brexit about to happen, the report made recommendations as to how to revitalise the local fishing industry.

Some of those proposals have had to be revised as a result of the outcome of Brexit negotiations, which were a disappointment to so many. However, Brexit provides the opportunity to manage our own waters in a better, more responsible way, and I will briefly highlight five areas where we can do that for the benefit of the marine environment and local people in coastal communities.

First, we need to review our marine governance arrangements. The UK has a complicated, multi-layered and multi-bodied system of marine management. That often leaves fishermen annoyed, frustrated and irritated as they find themselves being inspected by different officials from different bodies carrying out the same checks for the same reasons within days of each other.

Secondly, we need to put in place a comprehensive marine planning system that enables us better to manage the many activities that take place in UK waters. Those waters are becoming crowded places with many competing and conflicting uses—for example, wind farms, cables, marine protected areas, extraction of aggregates, capital dredging, the disposal of sediments, and a wide variety of fishing activities. The UK was one of the first countries in the world to legislate for a comprehensive marine planning system that would enable us better to manage those often conflicting uses. However, there is much work to be done and our exit from the EU gives us the opportunity to get on and do it.

Thirdly, fisheries management and marine conservation must be properly integrated in the marine planning system. Until now, that has not been possible as both were part of the EU legislative framework. Thus, we have a disjointed management system that is out of step with the UK’s ambition to be a global leader in marine conservation and marine management.

Fourthly, we need a system that better understands and better manages the impact of displacement, which can have devastating consequences for the marine environment, small-scale fishermen and coastal communities.

My final point is that we should do something different. We should involve the fishing industry—fishermen—in decision making. The sustainable future of the fishing industry depends entirely on healthy fish stocks. Fishermen have unparalleled local knowledge, and it makes sense to work with people with knowledge. To involve them in decision making would be in keeping with the spirit of World Oceans Day.