Fishing Industry

Robert Syms Excerpts

Thursday 29th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[David Duguid]

I totally agree. I would like to say that my hon. Friend had the foresight of predicting something I was going to say in my comments, but I was not, so I am grateful that he brought that up, because he is correct.

We now have control over our own fisheries regulations and management systems. Of course, we cannot apply regulations on vessels coming into our waters that do not equally apply to our vessels, but that is fine; that is how agreements between independent coastal states operate.

[Sir Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

The fact that we will get our own waters back in a phased way may well be necessary, because we need more boats and we need to attract people into the industry. One of the weaknesses we have is that it is a hard life being a fisherman, and many people do not want to go into the industry.

[David Duguid]

Sadly, my hon. Friend makes a valid point. Fishing, like farming or going offshore and working on an oil rig, is not for everyone; it is a hard life and a hard job. In many ways, we need to have grown up around it or been born into it. It is a generational thing. I will come back to that point later in my remarks, if my hon. Friend can be patient.

While we were under the control of the common fisheries policy, decision making always felt distant and imposed on our fishing industry from afar. Fisheries management is now managed more locally, with fisheries management plans run by local management groups to provide a formal and regular forum for engagement between fishermen, policymakers, scientists and regulators, not just for the good and the prosperity of the industry but for sustainability as well.

I have welcomed the fact that funding has been maintained, with £37 million being provided to replace the European maritime and fisheries fund, about £16 million of which goes directly to the Scottish Government to spend on fisheries and maritime issues. The £100 million UK seafood fund, which has also been welcomed, has been split between the topics of science and innovation, infrastructure, skills and training, and promotion of exports, which is a key element.

Can the Minister tell us what plans there are to help fund domestic marketing? She may be aware of the issues faced by those catching and supplying small haddock, for example, which is not traditionally an export species. How can the Government help to either promote more haddock consumption across the UK or open up new export markets for that fantastic product? I would also be interested to know what discussions the Department has had with Seafish, which I am told made a commercial decision last year to no longer promote seafood in the UK, preferring to focus on those growing export markets. I think everyone here would agree on the merits of fish as a high-quality, high-protein source of food with a relatively low carbon footprint.

On the subject of exports, I acknowledge that not every seafood exporter was fully ready to deal with the new export systems when they came into place immediately after we left the EU. I should also stress that many exporters—usually those who were already accustomed to exporting outside the European economic area—were ready to go with those new systems. The border operating model had gone through a few revisions, but had been available since it was rolled out in July the previous year. Funding and support had also been provided to impacted industries to help them prepare for the inevitability of the new systems. That included funding to devolved Administrations: for example, some £180 million was provided to the Scottish Government, which sadly I do not think was adequately applied to help exporters in Scotland. I also do not think the SNP Scottish Government helped the preparedness of our seafood exporters. I respect the view of the SNP as a political party that it did not want to leave the EU, but leave the EU we did, and it was something that we had to be prepared for.

It is also fair to acknowledge that even those exporters who had done everything right, who were accustomed to exporting around the world and got their paperwork systems in place, sadly fell foul of some of those IT systems crashing through no fault of their own. As such, I ask the Minister what assessment her Department has made of those export systems, and what improvements—for example, digitalisation and other time-saving methods—remain to be implemented.

I will now move on to the subject of spatial squeeze.

--- Later in debate ---

[Sir Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

Poole is the second largest natural harbour in the world and it has a long history of fishing, particularly in the north Atlantic. Indeed, the Dorset accent can sometimes be picked up in the Newfoundland accent, because so many people from Dorset ended up going to that part of Canada. We no longer fish that distance, but we still have a live fishing industry, mainly now in under 12 metre boats. There is a great opportunity for fishing, because of our coming out of the EU and being able to catch more catch. This does require investment and persuading people to go into what is a hard living if they are to make it a success.

I recently held a meeting, organised by Lyn Bourne, at the Poole fishermen’s dock. It was with a number of fishermen, including Mark Goulding, the skipper of Golden Girl PE1130. They were all a bit depressed, because they feel that we have come out of the EU and yet the various agencies are bringing in regulations that ought not to be applying to them. Those regulations are making their job more difficult and, in some cases, unviable. They expressed to me in clear terms that many of them feel, “The Government do not want us to continue fishing, otherwise why on earth would they be bringing in all these regulations?” I said that that is not true and that we want a vibrant and successful fishing industry. However, a number of things are landing on them that I do not think they particularly expected.

We ought to be doing all we can to keep people in the fishing industry, for reasons that many people in this debate have expressed. It is a potential growth industry and it is important, not least because of the “tail” created by fishermen, with all the other businesses fishing supports. It is easy to drive around Poole and see that the marine industry employs significantly more people in total than just fishermen, including those in various engineering and supply companies. So we want to do what we can to keep the industry going.

A number of points were made at that meeting. They have been raised in today’s debate, but I will repeat some of them. Those fishermen feel that the regulations are unfair and that they are being pushed out of their livelihood; the MCA vessel surveys and medicals are very much to the fore in this. The catch-up was mentioned a moment ago, and it requires solo fishermen, as many of these people are, to control their boat safely on the return to the harbour, while measuring catches and filling in things on smartphone apps, often with wet hands, on a rolling boat, in the dark. A further requirement is for all fishermen to have medical fitness assessments, five-yearly up to the age of 65 and then annually, which of course is an additional cost.

On the medicals, many on the inshore fishing fleet never go over the horizon, yet they are required to pass tests required of those on offshore large ships. Lifetime fishermen are being warned that they may lose their livelihood because of minor diabetes, colour blindness or weight. A doctor’s decision from a 30-minute consultation could leave them without an income and with no right of appeal. That is a concern to them. They also see that the MMO acknowledges that there ought to be grand- fathered rights but does not spell out what that means. So there is a degree of pessimism among many of the small fishermen in Poole about what is going on.

[David Duguid]

My hon. Friend is making some excellent points, some of which have, as he admitted, been made already. He mentioned diabetes as one of the conditions that would stop somebody from going out fishing in a small boat. Does he agree with the chief executive of the Scottish Fishermen’s Federation, Elspeth Macdonald, who asked, “How can a long-distance lorry driver drive down a motorway at 50 or 60 mph with those precise same conditions, yet someone with them could not go out on a small boat within 6 to 12 miles?”?

[Sir Robert Syms]

That is a good point; there is an element of gold-plating here. My hon. Friend the Member for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray), who chairs the all-party group on fisheries, made some important points about how we seem to be trying to solve a problem where there is not really one. This is rather like the British disease where members of a club start getting excited when one starts talking about the rules. Ministers ought to be a bit more robust with the agencies on what we need to do for safety and what does not make much difference but just makes earning a living far more difficult.

The I-VMS situation does not sound very good. Initially, the MMO had four suppliers. Many of the fishermen in Poole fitted an I-VMS from one of the suppliers that were subsequently suspended and are now waiting to see what happens. The MMO has said that it will provide £650,000 of grant funding to replace working equipment, but it may be replacing it with something less suitable than had been fitted. The MMO has not yet confirmed the procedure to follow for those with systems installed by the two suppliers that have been suspended. This is creating more uncertainty, because those fishermen might well be disallowed from fishing.

We need not only more clarity, but a bit of common sense in order to help and support our local fishermen. There is a great opportunity here, but we do require people who have given their life to fishing to continue with it. I get a strong feeling from the fishermen in Poole that most of them will continue to do it largely because they feel their obligation to hand on their boat to a relative, be it their son, grandson or whoever, as there is a strong tradition of fishing in certain families. They will not be doing it because they think they will be making a lot of money. Most of them think that some of these regulations are making their life more difficult than it needs to be.

I am pleased to have had the opportunity to raise these issues only a few days after meeting them in the House. I hope that the Government and indeed the fisheries Minister, who has had a bit of a kicking today, review some of these things, as they ought, so that we can get a successful fishing industry that the Government support, rather than bringing in regulations that get in the way.

Oil Spill: Poole Harbour

Robert Syms Excerpts

Monday 27th March 2023 Commons Chamber

[Rebecca Pow]

I thank the hon. Lady for recognising the importance of this incident, and for focusing on it specifically. We are taking it extremely seriously. The investigation is under way, and all the right protocols are in place. The Poole harbour commissioners have activated their emergency oil spill response plan, and specialist oil spill companies are assisting the operation. The Dorset local resilience forum has already set up and convened its strategic co-ordination group involving all the relevant bodies, including the commissioners themselves, but also the Environment Agency and the Maritime and Coastguard Agency. Each of those is contributing its input, as is Natural England, which has set up its south-west environment team to do its own work. All that will feed in the details that we need to ensure that all the necessary measures are taken and we can understand exactly what has occurred. I give the hon. Lady an assurance that the harbour remains open as usual, the ferry service is working and the local beaches are open, although as a precaution the public have been told to avoid using the water in Poole harbour for recreational purposes until further updates are available.

[Sir Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

I fully support my hon. Friend the Member for South Dorset (Richard Drax) in the comments he has made. The harbour commissioners have, of course, planned for this sort of thing over the years and are constantly updating their plans. The latest information is that 60% to 70% of the oil that was on the surface yesterday has been reduced, so we are well on top of the situation.

Clearly, the incident has an impact on public confidence, which is why we need an inquiry to look at it. This is a mature field that has been producing for more than 40 years, and some of the pipes might need replacing. Secondly, if the ability of fishermen and companies in Poole harbour to export seafood to France is temporarily suspended, my colleagues and I might wish to talk to the Minister for Food, Farming and Fisheries, my right hon. Friend the Member for Sherwood (Mark Spencer) about compensation.

UK Canals and Waterways

Robert Syms Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd November 2022 Westminster Hall

[Michael Fabricant]

I thank my hon. Friend for making that point. I have forgotten its name, but I have walked along the canal in Stone. It is a beautiful canal, and all the things it generates, such as pubs and the local life, mean that it is very much at the heart of the community.

To go back to funding, about half of the trust’s planned asset spend is now on reservoir safety. It has added about £70 million to its priority expenditure over five years. Despite those pressures, it has been very effective in developing its own income sources to reduce dependency on future Government funding. Its endowment has grown ahead of market benchmarks, and it has found innovative ways to grow commercial and charitable income.

The trust has built strong partnerships with others, such as the People’s Postcode Lottery, which has been a long-term funder, acting as a delivery partner with the Ministry of Justice, the Department for Transport, important public agencies such as Sport England and Natural England, and health service providers, which recognise the tangible benefits the trust can deliver. In 2021-22, the Government grant fell, having made up nearly 40% of the trust’s total income in the British Waterways days before 2010, and it is projected to decline to 20% of the trust’s income by 2027. The trust has therefore not been sitting idly by, just relying on Government funding.

The trust remains fully committed to reducing the share of its funding coming directly from Government over the long term and is continuing to work in partnership. That transition has to happen at a pace that reflects the reality on the ground; securing the investment our waterways need must be the priority. Without that, their future is at risk, the trust’s ability to maintain them is jeopardised, and millions could stand to lose the enjoyment of such a wide-reaching and essential national asset—what I referred to as a national treasure and part of our national heritage.

For those who live on boats, for businesses that depend on waterways, which we have heard about today, and for the services and utilities that need to be carried out on well-maintained towpaths, the effect could be even more devastating. The decline and deterioration of the waterways is an unthinkable outcome for the nation and the communities we represent. I spoke about this the other day on ITV, which also reported from a narrow boat, whose owner painted a bleak picture of what life on the waterways could be like. She said:

“Without that top layer of money coming in, the canals will probably go to rack and ruin; they’ll probably become muddy ditches and then nobody will want to walk along them, anglers won’t be able to fish and boaters will have nowhere to go.”

She compared the prospect of the decline of our canals—so central to our industrial heritage—with letting the Tower of London fall down.

Our canals are no longer simply remnants of our industrial past; they are a significant social, environmental and economic contributor to our modern society and an integral part of our national infrastructure and heritage. The Minister needs to confirm the timeline for these vital decisions, so that the trust is able to plan the vital investment in our waterways for the longer term, and to give reassurance to the millions who care so passionately for them. That the Government remain committed to the future of our national canal network must be made clear. Underfunding our canals would be a false economy; once they begin to decline, their demise may become inevitable and their benefits may be lost, as they enter a vicious circle, falling into ever worse neglect and disrepair. Like the once great Chesapeake and Ohio Canal, only once they are gone forever will a nation mourn their passing.

[Sir Robert Syms (in the Chair)]

I would like the winding-up speeches to start from around 10.30 am. If Members could stick to five minutes, that would be great. I call Jim Shannon.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ruth Jones (Newport West) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair this morning, Sir Robert.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Lichfield (Michael Fabricant) on securing this important debate on the future of Britain’s canals and waterways. He has campaigned tirelessly on this issue over the years, and with good reason. That was evident from his contribution and from the speeches and interventions by many others. It is not often that the Opposition are in full agreement with the hon. Member, but that is the case today. We should all congratulate ourselves on that.

I offer the apologies of my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds North West (Alex Sobel), the shadow Minister, for whom I am subbing today. He is away from the parliamentary estate on shadow ministerial business, so I have been drafted in to guide us through the calm waters of this debate.

This country was the first in the world to develop a nationwide canal network that connected towns and cities, brought people together and developed and stimulated so much of the trade, industry and commerce that modern Britain was built on. I have the great pleasure of serving the people of Newport West, and in our neck of the woods we boast a unique flight of 14 locks, the Cefn flight, which rises 160 feet in just half a mile. That must have been an amazing sight in its heyday. Such locks and canals are a legacy of the engineering wonder of the industrial revolution, and they also make up part of the Monmouthshire and Brecon canal network, which is widely recognised as being one of the most beautifully located set of waterways in Britain. I give a shout out to the Monmouthshire, Brecon and Abergavenny Canals Trust for all the work that it does, and in particular to Councillor Yvonne Forsey and the other volunteers in Newport West.

Our canals are no longer the arteries of trade that they were 200 years ago. The car, bike, van and truck have all come through the middle of them—literally. Today, canals and riverways mainly provide other functions—possibly too many to list in the short time I have to speak, which only shows their importance. We have already heard that they offer free and accessible outdoor space and recreation for millions of people. Indeed, Adam Jogee, who works in my office, and his fiancée Alison Lawther, alongside two of their friends, Mark Streather and Allison Katz, took the chance to stay on a canal boat during a recent recess. It was Adam’s first time on a canal, and he said that although it was a little chilly at night they had a great time on the canals around Bosworth, Stoke Golding and Nuneaton. I hope the hon. Member for Lichfield is pleased to know that on this side of the House we do not just praise our canals but use and cherish them, too.

Our canals provide homes for boaters; importantly, they help to prevent floods; and they have given us a network of green corridors steeped in rich industrial history that is unlike anywhere else in the world. Our waterways are also home to tens of thousands of different species, including some of our most precious creatures, such as bats, water voles and dormice, all of which are at risk of extinction. This debate gives us an opportunity to air our concerns and bring attention to the fact that we all need to do more and go further. Given that the United Kingdom sits in the bottom 10% of countries globally when it comes to biodiversity, it seems obvious that we should do everything in our power to protect the unique habitats we have and the plants and wildlife that call them home. That is what His Majesty’s Opposition will do when we win the next election.

We are broadly at one on the issue, but I cannot let the Minister leave before I have raised a number of specific issues. I know she would expect nothing less. She knows that the job of protecting and developing our phenomenal canal and waterway network falls largely to the Canal & River Trust, so why have Ministers postponed the announcement of the trust’s grant, which provides around a quarter of its funding? It was due to be announced on 1 July. The fact that the Government—well, two Prime Ministers ago—were collapsing is no excuse not to ensure a sustainable and long-term programme of support for the trust, so why, as the final leaves fall from the trees, have we still not heard from the Government, despite their assurances that the overdue funding would be allocated in autumn? The delay is threatening the future of our canals and of all those who rely on them. Furthermore, it makes it more difficult for the trust to plan for the future and hampers the progress of a number of large projects that are designed to help to build and shape much-needed resilience to the harsh and increasingly frequent effects of climate change.

Indeed, the Office for Environmental Protection—a body set up by the Government only last year—has received a complaint describing the constant delays as being

“at risk of becoming the default culture within Defra”,

and just weeks ago the Government failed to meet their own legal deadline to introduce targets on clean air, land and water. There have been many more missed deadlines, quietly scrapped funds and delays to important legislation—I am thinking in particular of the Animal Welfare (Kept Animals) Bill.

As we discuss the future of Britain’s canals and waterways, I am conscious of the fact that, behind the grand environmental claims, Ministers constantly make the wrong choices. The Opposition believe that is unacceptable, and we want Ministers to be active and to speak out much more quickly. It is not hard to wonder whether the delay in the announcement of the grant for the Canal & River Trust is about whether to slash it or scrap it. If that happens, the trust has been clear that it will not be able to maintain its work of protecting our precious waterways.

At a time of ecological and economic crisis, Britain’s canals and waterways are a haven for wildlife and people alike. I ask the Minister to heed our calls, and the calls made by Government Members, and commit herself to protecting our heritage, saving our wildlife and preserving much-needed opportunities for future generations by properly funding Britain’s canals and waterways, and to do that today.

[Sir Robert Syms (in the Chair)]

Before I call the Minister, let me remind the hon. Member for Lichfield (Michael Fabricant), who introduced the debate, that he might get a minute or two to make a winding-up speech.

EU Referendum: Energy and Environment

Robert Syms Excerpts

Tuesday 12th July 2016 Commons Chamber

[Barry Gardiner]

My hon. Friend and constituency neighbour has run a superb campaign on fuel poverty. She makes reference to the £1.7 billion that the Competition and Markets Authority report showed UK bill payers were being overcharged—overcharged by quite obscene amounts. It is, of course, right for the Government to come up with clear proposals about how to tackle that abuse, without just saying, as they have to date, that people need to be enabled to switch more easily.

[Mr Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

This is one of the first of our debates to mention the result of the EU referendum. I know that the hon. Gentleman was on the other side of the argument, so it would be useful if he told us whether, when it comes to a vote, he will vote to leave the EU despite his heavy heart or will he vote against the wishes of the British people?

[Barry Gardiner]

I always try to look at the motion in front of me on the Order Paper and make a judgment on it when I see what it says. I have done so for the past 19 and a half years, and I suspect I shall probably do it for the next few years as well.

Even the Government-dominated Select Committee has warned that what it calls the “hiatus” in project developments could threaten the UK’s ability to meet its energy and climate security targets, so when the Department’s own figures show the need for £100 billion of investment by 2020 to make our electricity infrastructure fit for purpose, the Secretary of State really does have to explain where she believes that investment is going to come from, given that investor confidence in her Department is at an all-time low.

Before the Secretary of State does so, however, perhaps she will confirm whether she instructed her Department not to prepare in any way for a leave vote, as the Prime Minister apparently directed. If that is so, can she explain why, because that is what business leaders out there are asking? It seems incomprehensible to them that the Prime Minister took such a gigantic risk with their future—a risk that will increase their cost of capital and the cost of energy to bill payers, both corporate and domestic alike—yet made absolutely no preparations for what might happen when that risk went the wrong way.

The IIGCC—Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change—a group of institutional investors representing over €13 trillion in assets, said in the aftermath of the vote to leave that it had brought

“considerable uncertainty and market turmoil.”

That only goes to prove that the art of litotes is not yet dead!

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to speak in today’s debate. Oppositions, being Oppositions, often fire questions at Governments and this is a particularly difficult time for a Government to answer all the questions. We are about to change Prime Minister, there will probably be a substantial reshuffle in the Government and Ministers will then get down to dealing with the consequences of what the British people have decided.

Many of the points made by the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) were, “What’s going to happen with regulations?” and, “What’s going to happen with things we have signed up to?” I do not believe this Parliament is going to go through every piece of European legislation we have passed over the past 40 years and decide whether we want to keep it or not. The most likely outcome is enabling legislation that rolls everything we have agreed with the EU into UK legislation, with this Government and future Governments at their leisure then being able to pick through what they want to do. That is the most sensible approach. It may mean that we get rid of some legislation in some areas and in others we strengthen it. Whatever the outcome, this Parliament will make sure it picks what is best for our country. We must bear in mind that quite a lot of the legislation has been agreed with 27 other states. Some of it may not be that applicable or relevant to us, but there may be things where we want to improve standards. As my hon. Friend the Member for South West Wiltshire (Dr Murrison) said, our environmental record on clean air and everything else predates our joining the EU, and the UK has often been more vociferous in these areas than many EU states.

[Mary Creagh]

The hon. Gentleman said that most of our air quality legislation predates the EU, but of course the Clean Air Act 1956 was all about stopping people burning things in London and creating the big smogs—it made no mention about diesel particulate matter, because diesel cars had not been invented then.

[Mr Syms]

Of course, things move on. My basic point is that just because we are out of the EU does not mean this Parliament cannot make sensible decisions about how to protect our citizens from things such as the hon. Lady mentions.

[Geraint Davies]

rose—

[Mr Syms]

I shall make a little progress, if I may.

My guess is that we will have enabling legislation and we will deal at our leisure with the consequences of Britain leaving in terms of the detail and the European directives we have signed over the years, with this Government and future Governments determining their priorities.

I now wish to talk about energy. I am sure that when the Secretary of State was given her tasks the first thing the Prime Minister said to her was, “Don’t let the lights go out.” Given the capacity, the grid and demand, that is probably her principal concern in her job and it was probably the principal concern of her predecessors. I am pleased with many of the things that the Government have done, but we do have to increase capacity, and where I disagree with the comments from the SNP and others is on the fact that we do need nuclear capacity as part of that. Whether the deal is a good or bad one depends on crystal ball-gazing over the next 40 years as to what will happen with energy prices. They are terribly difficult to predict. All I predict is that they will go up and they will go down, but I do not know when. In the last Parliament, the Labour party had a policy of freezing energy prices, but the moment the party made that its policy, energy prices started to fall, which proved that freezing them was probably the worst thing to do. We all know that energy prices go up and down, and that that is to do with the market; it is not necessarily about our being in the EU.

I also caution colleagues against drawing any long-term conclusions from what has happened in the markets, given that it has been only about two weeks since we had a vote to leave the EU. Long-term interest rates have fallen, the pound has gone up and gone down, and markets have gone up and gone down. I suspect that over the next year or two there will be a bumpy ride in some markets as decisions have to be made on our future. The UK Government have to do our best to increase capacity, and that means nuclear power, more gas and fracking. I know a lot of people do not like fracking, but there is a natural resource that we have to make use of.

There is one area where I might have some disagreement with the Secretary of State. She mentioned running down some of the coal-fired power stations, but until we are certain that some of the investment is starting to kick in, I would be a little reluctant to close off some of that capacity, because it will be challenge for us to keep the lights on in the future. The problems we have in capacity are largely caused not by this Government or the coalition Government, but by the previous Labour Governments, who put off taking decisions. In particular, they had a White Paper that did not even include nuclear power. I welcome a lot of what the coalition Government did and what this Government have done, but we need to improve confidence and investment so that we have more capacity in the energy market.

I welcome a lot of what the Government have done. There is no reason why this country should not still be at the forefront of fighting environmental damage. I still think this country can provide lessons to the EU. I do not believe our leaving will be a disaster; it is a great opportunity for our country. We have to make it a success, and I am sure this Parliament is perfectly capable of making decisions that benefit our citizens rather more than some of those made in the EU.