Fisheries: EU Landing Obligation (European Union Committee Report)

Viscount Hanworth Excerpts

Thursday 23rd January 2020 Lords Chamber

[Viscount Hanworth (Lab)]

The global depletion of the fish stocks is a prime example of the environmental depredations that have been occurring throughout the 20th century and of which we are becoming increasingly conscious. Fish stock depletion is an example of the phenomenon that has come to be known as the tragedy of the commons. This refers to a circumstance where the self-interested pursuit of individual advantages leads to an outcome that is to the detriment of everyone.

The tragedy of the depletion of fish stocks has been rendered all the more intractable by the invisibility of the marine environment. Nevertheless, awareness of the hazard is not new. The threat to the northern fish stocks became apparent in the 1880s with the advent of steam-powered trawlers. In comparison with their sail-driven predecessors, they were able to travel further, to be at sea for longer and to use larger gear that could reach deeper.

Already by 1885, trawling had become controversial. A government inquiry of that year was charged with examining claims that fish stocks were being reduced and marine environments damaged. However, given the abundant and increasing quantities of fish being landed, the claim must have seemed to many implausible. Here, we have an early instance of an illusion regarding the abundance of fish that has beset the fishing industry for many years. The size of the fish harvest has been maintained in the face of declining fish stocks by deploying ever-improving fishing technologies. Eventually, and inevitably, one will be faced with the reality that most of the fish are gone and the harvests have been severely reduced, if not extinguished. This is the current reality throughout the world.

It has been estimated that the biomass of the fish stocks of the North Atlantic is today only 10% of its pre-industrial levels. This inference is based on the size of the harvest relative to the efforts devoted to catching it. This might be startling until it is recalled that, by 1990, the once-abundant stock of Newfoundland cod had been eliminated through fishing.

The landing of fish by the British home fleet provides only a dim indication of the state of the fish stocks, but they are of some interest in their own right. In 1910, they weighed over 1 million tonnes and followed a downward trend to reach 400,000 tonnes by 2010. During both world wars, fishing was severely curtailed. That allowed the stocks partially to recover but thereafter the downward trend resumed.

The depletion of the fish stocks occasioned the so-called cod wars between Britain and Iceland, during which Iceland sought to preserve its local resources while Britain continued to demand access to them. The cod wars concluded in 1976 with a victory for Iceland. The United Kingdom agreed to a 200-mile exclusion zone around Iceland. Not long after, in 1982, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea established exclusive economic zones in which nations have sole rights to the economic exploitation of marine territories that lie within 200 miles of their shores. If the seas do not extend far enough, the zones are bounded by median lines between adjacent territories.

Britain’s fishermen were highly aggrieved by their exclusion from Icelandic waters. That sense of grievance has continued to this day, albeit aggravated by other causes. It has made them willing, if not eager, to flout the rules and regulations that seek to constrain their activities and ensure the sustainability of fishing. When Britain joined the European Union in 1973, there was little thought of her asserting exclusive fishing rights. Britain could not reasonably exclude other European nations from the waters in which they had traditionally fished.

All maritime members of the unions were given access to the common seas, via the common fisheries policy. Each member was given quotas that defined the amount of fish of each species that they were allowed to catch. The allowances are supposed to be set according to the advice of marine scientists regarding sustainable levels of harvesting. In practice, they have been subject to intense bargaining among the member states and they have invariably exceeded the advised levels.

The quotas defined only the quantity of fish that could be landed legally. The intention of ensuring the sustainability of fishing has been vitiated by the resort of fishermen to the practice of discarding, whereby they throw back to sea any fish in excess of their specific quotas while they attempt to fulfil the remaining quotas. There is also the common practice of upgrading, whereby any fish that are undersized and might otherwise count towards the quotas are discarded.

In 2013, the European Union Commission enacted a ban on discarding fish. The intention was that the ban should be introduced gradually, to become fully applicable to all fish subject to quotas by 2019. The two recent reports of the House of Lords EU Energy and Environment Sub-Committee have testified that the discard ban has been widely ignored by British fishermen. Moreover, our Government have not been effective in enforcing the ban. Their defence has been that they cannot be expected actively to implement the ban until other European fishing nations do likewise. This will no longer be a valid defence after Britain has left the European Union when it will seek to assert control over its fishing territories and over the access of other nations to those waters.

It appears that the Government are intent on asserting rights to the entirety of the UK exclusive economic zone. The exclusive economic zones of some European fishing nations, including Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and Denmark, are highly constrained by their proximity to Britain, while that of the UK extends far into the North Sea. Given the exorbitant extent of the UK zone compared to those of other European nations, this intention is liable to be strongly resisted. It is possible that a dispute over fishing rights will vitiate the other negotiations that must accompany Brexit.

Recent statements by the Government suggest that they wish the resources of our local seas to be exploited more fully. Therefore, one can imagine that the objective of conserving the fish stocks is liable to be neglected. The pursuit of a policy of conservation is liable to be frustrated by the fact that the supervision of fisheries is to be devolved to the authorities of the constituent parts of the UK. These will have to contend with the pressures of some highly organised and assertive parties, not least the Scottish Fishermen’s Federation.

Nevertheless, models exist for how Britain might successfully manage its fish stocks. The Norwegians, who are not members of the European Union, have successfully managed their fisheries for many years. They have effectively nationalised their fishing industry giving ownership to their Government, albeit that the ownership is licensed to fishing co-operatives. They have also maintained an effective discard ban for at least 30 years.