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Mr. Salmond: I did not realise that the hon. Gentleman had left the subject of salmon farming. Is he aware that, at the weekend, a former Commissioner, a Mr. Bruce Millan, attributed the failure of the Scottish junior Minister to achieve satisfactory results to ministerial inexperience? Regardless of whether it was inexperience, it was certainly a very belated effort.
Mr. Wallace: The House well knows that we argued for some time before the Cabinet would accept the position. I am not sure that it helps the Minister in his attempt to win something for us at the weekend if we all denounce him as being inexperienced. I know that the Minister and the Scottish Office have taken a very positive approach to that. Our complaint lay with other Departments. Now that, at long last, the Government have got a line on that, we wish the Minister well and hope that he can negotiate something positive for the salmon farming industry at the end of the week.
I was saying that, in proposing radical reform of the common fisheries policy, Liberal Democrats recommend the decentralisation of management, with the involvement of skippers and fisheries scientists. That would lead to better informed decision making, and decisions to which people have contributed are more likely to command their confidence and active co-operation.
What the Minister of State said today, repeating almost verbatim one of the points that he made in the 10-point plan that he unveiled in Plymouth, gives us cause for hope that that approach--a much more regional dimension, local management of fisheries--will gain momentum. As the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East (Dr. Strang) said, Liberal Democrats have called for that in many debates. Sometimes Ministers have tried to rubbish us, but we will always welcome the sinner that repents. We only regret the fact that it has taken 17 years and a minority Government to bring about their repentance, but we encourage them in developing that line of thinking.
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That was one of the recommendations of the common fisheries policy review group, in which my constituent, Mr. John Goodlad, played a constructive and distinguished part. When do the Government intend to respond formally to the 40 or more recommendations of the review group? The Minister said that that would happen in the near future, but following such a high-quality, constructive report, we want a better idea of the timetable for a response and implementation.
I agreed with many of the report's conclusions, including the non-viability of renouncing the common fisheries policy unilaterally and the need to boost decommissioning, to consider a scrap and build policy and to consider other institutional arrangements, including regionalism.
There are immediate issues to be dealt with, including the position on multi-annual guidance programme IV and flags of convenience. As we have heard time and again tonight, the two are linked, not solely because of the linkage that the Government have stated, but because it is unreasonable to set a further MAGP requirement for Britain when we are purporting to negotiate the removal from the fisheries register of 20 per cent. of the fleet flying the Union flag as a matter of convenience.
Do the Government intend to make any negotiations on quota hopping retrospective? The Government have said that they have taken the initiative by seeking a solution to the problem in the IGC, but what do they mean by a solution? Will it apply to future transfers of licences or will there be a retrospective element?
What is being done to pursue the initiative? The hon. Member for Ruislip-Northwood (Mr. Wilkinson), in an intervention, suggested that the reference to that important aspect of our negotiations on the IGC had been dropped from the Irish proposals and relegated to an appendix. I understand that there was a four-line reference to it on page 134 under the heading, "Part B--Other Issues". I am not sure that that is the type of profile that has been presented to us in the House. What profile are Ministers seeking for that? How often have member state capitals been visited by Ministers or by departmental senior officials to promote the ideas? I do not expect the Minister to show us his full negotiating hand, but we would like to be reassured that there is some tangible evidence of progress. His winding-up speech will give the Minister an opportunity to transmit such a message, not just to the House but to the fishing industry.
Related to that is a point that I raised in an intervention. What precisely is the Government's attitude to MAGP IV? Last June, the Minister was talking about assembling a blocking minority. In October, in a letter to the Scottish Fishermen's Federation, the Prime Minister said:
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The hon. Member for St Ives (Mr. Harris) said that his reason for voting for the Government tonight was the response that he had received from the Prime Minister to a letter that he had sent him on 1 January earlier this year. The response that I have had is my reason for voting against the Government. Where were they for 17 years, if it is only now that they have woken up and have what the hon. Gentleman described as a fisheries policy?
It is not as if the Government were not warned. At the time when pressure stock licences were introduced, some of us argued that, rather than being sold on, they should revert to a pool and perhaps be reallocated, thus ensuring that the remoter fishing communities of our country would not lose out through the licences' being drawn away to--as many of us thought--other parts of the United Kingdom, or, as has in fact happened, to other countries. The monetary ethic of Thatcherism prevailed, however. In time, many skippers found that the best offers came from foreign vessel owners. Nothing was done about the problem during our presidency in 1992, and it remains today.
Throughout the late 1980s and early 1990s, many Opposition Members and some exceptional Conservative Members--the hon. Member for St Ives was one, and we heard especially distinguished contributions from the late Alick Buchanan-Smith--argued for a well-funded decommissioning scheme, but too little was done too late. As a result, as other European Union countries, notably Spain, now receive grants to modernise their fleet, our fleet, unaided, grows older. That is due either to wilful neglect or to a cavalier disregard for the industry on which so many livelihoods depend, both at sea and on shore, in communities where alternative employment can be scarce.
We have heard much rhetoric, but the details of implementation have been scanty. The amendment that has been selected--like the amendment tabled by my right hon. and hon. Friends and me--calls the Government to account for their stewardship of fisheries policies over the past 17 years. Regrettably, it has been a record of neglect and failure, and we will vote against the Government tonight.
Mr. Deputy Speaker (Sir Geoffrey Lofthouse):
Order. Before I call the next speaker, I must point out that nine hon. Members wish to speak in the 97 minutes that are available before the winding-up speeches. I hope that, with a bit of co-operation, they will all be able to do so.
Rev. Ian Paisley (North Antrim):
The fishing industry in Northern Ireland continues to suffer one blow after another as a result of policies dictated by the common fisheries policy in Brussels.
Let me remind the House of the vital importance of the fishing industry to Northern Ireland's economy. More than 2,000 people are employed in the industry, with another 1,200 actively engaged on fishing trawlers. The entire industry is worth more than £20 million per year to the Northern Ireland economy. In recent years, however, the industry has suffered one major crisis after another. Each year, fishermen's livelihoods are put in jeopardy as a result of annual cuts in the fishing quotas in the Irish sea, and this year is no exception.
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Once again, we face the prospect of Irish sea fishing quotas' being reduced from a level that is already intolerable. Since 1990, the total allowable catch in the Irish sea has been reduced by 40 per cent. We are saying that we cannot take any more reductions: if the TAC is reduced any further, there will be no fleet left. Those are the stern, hard facts that the Northern Ireland fishing industry faces. This year, it is proposed that the cod quota should remain at 6,200 tonnes, and the sole quota at 1,000 tonnes. Whiting, however, is down 30 per cent. from 9,000 to 6,400 tonnes, and plaice from 2,450 to 1,800. The herring catch has been restricted to 7,000 tonnes.
Along with the leader of the SDLP--who, like me, happens to be a Member of the European Parliament--and accompanied by the chairmen of Mourne, Newtownards and Down councils and their staff and councillors and the hon. Member for South Down (Mr. McGrady), I was part of a delegation that met the top brass of the fishing commission. We were amazed at its ignorance of what was happening in the Irish sea. Its members told us that fish were scarce, saying, "We are only doing this to give you some industry." They said that conservation must take place.
Before we went there, the commission told the fishermen that they could not have any more haddock out of the sea--that they were very scarce. Well, there are more haddock in the Irish sea tonight than there have been since Noah's Ark floated on the waters. The commission's leading expert admitted something to is: he said, "When I was told that there were haddock in the Irish sea and that they were spawning, I did not believe it, but I went on my own and discovered that the fishermen were right." Why cannot those fishermen take the haddock out of the sea? That expert also confirmed something about herring. It is more than ever possible to fish for herring in the Irish sea--and not red herring.
We were told that nephrops--or prawns, as they are commonly called--were ample and abundant; yet the proposal is to keep the fishermen from fishing for them. What sort of scheme is this so-called common fisheries policy? That is what the fishermen who are sitting in the Strangers Gallery are asking, and rightly so. Why can they not fish for the fish that are plentiful? We look to the Government to do something.
There has been talk of the Hague preference. In 1992, a Minister promised in the House of Lords that the Government were determined to do something about the Hague preference in regard to the Irish sea. What did they do? They did nothing. Meanwhile, our fishermen must watch the spectacle of fishermen from the Republic--when the Republic takes up its option--coming into their fishing grounds, and fishing freely where our men are not allowed to fish for their own fish. That must cease.
I understand the worry about the Hague preference expressed by the hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Wallace). In certain cases, it gave precedence to extra fish for British fishermen, but in the Irish sea we have a problem different from problems anywhere else. The Government must face up to that problem, and a satisfactory result must be found.
The Irish Republic has a very liberal quota and from its point of view it is right to say that there are not many fish in the Irish sea. The fewer fish that it says there are
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Where there are fish in abundance people should be allowed to catch them. Northern Ireland fishermen are told, "Your catch has been reduced by 40 per cent. Now cut it again by 30 per cent. to give a total cut of 70 per cent." Next year, they will suggest that we cut it by another 10 per cent. Day after day our fishing industry is being decimated. I pity Northern Ireland Members who have fishing interests in their constituencies. We come here and speak about the industry and travel to Brussels but evidently there are to be no changes.
The Government should look at the Lassen report although, of course, it has been overtaken by other matters. It suggested reducing our fleet by another 40 per cent. It might as well state that we should give up the industry altogether. Now it has come up with another view of segmentation of the fleet, and that would be disastrous. Fishermen tell me that, because of its capacity, it would be impossible to do that with the Northern Ireland fleet.
Our prawn fisheries have also been attacked because it is said that prawns are scarce. But even the scientists say that there are plenty of prawns and Lassen is one of Europe's top officials. There is grave concern about the technical conservation measures that are being proposed by the Commission. They include measures about the size of the nets, the size of fish that can be landed and the areas in which fish can be caught.
In the Irish sea the proposals take no account of the regional diversities of home waters. For example, prawns are one of the most important stocks for Ulster fishermen, but the Commission proposes to increase the minimum landing size from 70 mm to 105 mm overnight. There is no justification for that and scientists are arguing about it. Even the Department's scientists advise us that if this measure is introduced in the Irish sea we would have to forget about 60 per cent. of all the prawns that are currently fished: 60 per cent. would be lost. What is left to fishermen who are faced with such percentages?The Government must go to Europe and save us from the discrimination that seems to be applied to Northern Ireland's fishermen. There is a vendetta to destroy the Province's entire fishing fleet. It is a matter of life and death.
We hear much about decommissioning, but what do Northern Ireland fishermen do when their vessels have been decommissioned? They have nowhere to go. Are we to say to those people, "Although there are plenty of fish you must decommission your boat"? A fishermen told me, "I thought that it was best for me to decommission, and I did. I did my best to start a company with the money but I had many problems and I was unable to run a viable company. I had to buy another vessel to eke out some sort of living in what I was brought up to do."
The Government must adopt a vigorous stance in Europe. This is a fight for the existence of our fleet. It is a scandal that other member states, notably the Spanish, are effectively exporting their overcapacity problem to the United Kingdom by being allowed to operate vessels under the British flag and fish against our quotas. Government commitments on that issue must be
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"we have made it clear that we will not implement further compulsory cuts in the UK fleet while the quota hopping issue remains unresolved".
The Minister of State gave a complex reply to that question, replying further to the hon. Member for Edinburgh, East that the Government were not contemplating such action. We want to know whether this is a question of trying to block the provision, or whether it is a question of allowing an agreement to be reached by the other member states which we will not implement. It is important for that to be clarified. Those issues--quota-hopping and capacity reduction--have crept up on the Government because of their neglect in the past.
7.52 pm
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