Examination of Witnesses (Questions 180-199)
MR BEN
BRADSHAW, MR
RODNEY ANDERSON
AND MR
CHRIS RYDER
8 DECEMBER 2004
Q180 Alan Simpson: How
do you see the penalties system applying? The Scottish Fishermen's
Federation say they regard this as "a breach of civil liberties"
and the South Devon and Channel Shellfishermen claim it is "contrary
to the trusted system of British justice". How do you see
a penalty system working in ways that will have a credible basis
of its own justice built into it rather than an arbitrary justice
that people seem to fear?
Mr Anderson: We
first have to understand just what we mean by administrative penalties
and that they come in different shapes, sizes and flavours. The
advantage of administrative penalties potentially for both the
industry and the regulator is that they provide a measure of certainty,
or can do, so that if one can identify particular offences then
there could be a fixed penalty, for example. One of the difficulties
that the industry has flagged up to us under the current regulatory
regime is the uncertainty of the outcome of a prosecution, for
example. Another potential advantage is that they can be much
quicker and the process of going to court can be a very lengthy
one. So you have a combination, at the moment in many circumstances,
of a considerable measure of uncertainty about the outcome coupled
with long delays and from a business perspective that is not a
healthy situation to find yourself in. They offer efficiencies
both for the regulator and for the industry but they are not a
panacea. We would not be allowed to undermine, for example, the
human rights legislation. The intention is not to do that, it
is to introduce a regime which actually meets both the needs of
the industry and the regulators. It is an area where we are working
with the industry. We have consulted them already once, there
will be further dialogue and I see this as part and parcel of
the process that we are taking forward through the Strategy Unit
report response. The process is almost as important as the end.
We are working in a way which I think it is fair to say that as
a Department we have not worked before with the industry, ie in
a very collaborative fashion. We have working groups that are
being set up with the stakeholders, including the industry, themselves
preparing papers, themselves very much a part of the process of
coming up with solutions and being involved in the dialogue and
discussion. It is a very transparent process. I am confident that
when we are in a position to put forward recommendations to ministers
and when the Government is able to produce a response on the administrative
penalties the issues will be fully explored. It does not mean
everybody will be happy about the outcome, but it does mean we
will have had an unusual opportunity to consider in-depth quite
what the implications of what we are proposing at the moment are.
Mr Bradshaw: Why
would honest fishermen, who are the vast majority, not want strict
enforcement and harsh penalties for what is theft, theft from
them and theft from the rest of us?
Chairman: Yes, but in
view of the row over charging light dues on the fishing industry,
I think you might have to wait for a period when they have more
faith in the management regime, particularly in the CFP's ability
of marine conservation, before they will all be happy with paying
charges, but let's move on.
Q181 Ms Atherton: I want
to move on to the inshore sector and the shellfish industry. The
Strategy Unit proposes that displaced boats should move into that
sector, but Defra recently said certainly in terms of the inshore
that they did not see, as a department, further growth and that
basically the industry would be static, yet the Strategy Unit
report said that there would be more the more into this new sector
you go. The industry, the shellfish industry and the inshore sector,
is saying to us, "Look, many people already will have been
displaced and will have moved into this sector", so where
is this new growth area? Where is it because many people are saying
to us that they cannot see it?
Mr Bradshaw: Well,
there has already been quite a lot of movement from whitefish
into shellfish and nephrops, for example, but you are right, Ms
Atherton, to raise the concern that if everyone were to suddenly
rush into an uncontrolled and unrestricted shellfishery, then
we could simply repeat the problems that we have seen in the cod
fishery and in the shellfishery and that is exactly why we have
introduced a licensing system to restrict movement at the moment.
All of these things will have to be kept under review and I think
it is worth at this stage highlighting the fact that the shellfish
sector and the nephrops sector are both doing extremely well,
extremely well. I only wish we could add some value to the product
that they collect from the seas rather than export so much of
it straight abroad, but in our part of the world, for example,
for our crab and lobster fishermen, it is a healthy, sustainable
and profitable fishery.
Q182 Ms Atherton: I would
agree with you, but it is under-represented in terms of policy
development and sustainability and in all the fora of the fishing
industry. For example, the Sustainable Fisheries Programme has
50 participants of whom only one represents the inshore and shellfish
sector. That is a very small voice when, if you look at the figures,
the commercial fishery sector brings in the same as the recreational
sea anglers who, very much in our part of the world, are a huge
part of our economy. It is the same amount and yet we do not place
anything like as much emphasis on this industry as we do on the
commercial sector. What are you going to do to change that and
to give them a proper voice?
Mr Bradshaw: My
colleagues may want to comment on the makeup of the stakeholder
group in a second, but I would agree that I think historically
both the shellfish sector and the recreational angling sector
have been under-represented in those bodies which have been critical
in terms of our decision-making, but I think that is changing.
Both are represented on the RACs, both are represented on the
stakeholder group, and we have taken some specific policy decisions
on cetaceans, for example, and other decisions to the benefit
of the recreational angling sector. I am critically aware of the
importance of the recreational angling sector to the UK's economy
and am determined that they should have a voice. If you look at
what is happening in the south-western fishery, for example, again
they are represented there and making their voice heard and I
think there is a recognition in the commercial catching sector
that that is the way forward, that there are numerous bodies and
groups that have an interest in how we manage our seas and that
the recreational fishing sector are part of that group of interests.
Would you like to add anything?
Mr Ryder: Yes,
just to comment on the makeup of the stakeholder advisory group.
We have a high-level group of stakeholders that is closely involved
in the development of the response. That is a high-level strategic
group and I do not recognise the statement that it has 50 members.
We have, I think, 20-odd members and they are all stakeholders
drawn from a broad range of stakeholder interests, but this is
not actually the area where most of the engagement and work is
going on. The Strategy Unit presented its report as the basis
for discussion involving all stakeholders and Her Majesty's Government
and devolved administrations and this is a huge, collaborative
exercise that is going on. There are a number of working groups
in which, as Rodney Anderson has explained, various stakeholders
are working very closely with officials and contributing ideas
and papers. One of those groups is devoted entirely to the inshore
development issues and there is a quite heavy involvement there
from people with a close interest in that, so when you consider
all the levels of stakeholder engagement, I would say that all
of those with an interest are very closely involved.
Q183 Ms Atherton: Well,
they do not agree, but I have put it to you today and perhaps
you could go back and look at the numbers and let us know. One
of the other proposals of the Strategy Unit was for regional and
inshore managers. We have heard some criticism that people do
not know what this means, who they will report to, where they
will be based, and critically who they will be, so have you any
clarity that you can give to us on how and who they will report
to and their relationship to the regional advisory councils?
Mr Bradshaw: Well,
they will ultimately report to whoever is responsible for fisheries
policy if and when they are established, but I think the importance
of the idea of having regional managers was for the very reason
that you suggested in your question, that at the moment people
do not have a single person that they can go to if they have a
problem who has a grasp of the local and regional issues; they
all come to me. As part of our desire to devolve and get away
from the system where UK Ministers or Scottish Ministers or officials
in Brussels have to micro-manage every tiny decision that is made
at a local level, the idea of regional managers fitting into the
structure and other ideas like the Marine Agency would be a sensible
way forward to give the industry and other interested parties
a single recognisable point of contact on policy issues.
Q184 Ms Atherton: But
where would you see them emerging from—from the industry
itself or from marine conservation?
Mr Bradshaw: I
do not think that we are being prescriptive at this stage as to
what sort of people might do this job. There are people with all
sorts of expertise, industry expertise, and there are a lot of
people in the fishing industry who have expertise in lots of areas.
A lot of them have been fishermen and they have become inspectors
or they were inspectors and have become fishermen or they were
scientists. People move around. It is one of the encouraging aspects
that I have found in the short time I have done this job, that
there are a lot of people around with a great deal of expertise
who have been both poachers and gamekeepers and bring a lot of
experience to the job description that we are describing.
Q185 Chairman: Do you
see that as being a part of Defra's structure or a regional planning
structure which is going to take an increasing part in fishing
or as part of the industry structure?
Mr Bradshaw: Well,
one of the recommendations in the Strategy Unit report for the
long term was the establishment of an independent Marine Agency
rather like you have the Environment Agency dealing with the land
and I think that has a great deal of merit in it. As I mentioned
earlier, the Government has already signalled its intention to
introduce the Marine Bill, and it is not every year or even every
five or ten years that major Marine Bills come around, so I think
this Marine Bill will give us an opportunity to get the structure
in place that we want and what that structure will be will become
clearer when we give our formal response to the Strategy Unit
report and when we announce the development of our proposals for
a Marine Bill.
Q186 Chairman: Let's move
on to the strategic assessments and environmental impact assessments.
The industry, I think, broadly sees these as an unnecessary complication
and a means of restricting fishing and something of a burden on
them. How important, how essential, how necessary are they to
the development of the Strategy Unit's plans?
Mr Bradshaw: I
am not quite sure what impact assessments are being talked about,
Chairman.
Q187 Chairman: Well, you
have got strategic economic assessments and you have got the environmental
impact assessments on fishing. I am not clear how they are going
to be conducted, whether they are going to apply to new fisheries
or new gear or whatever, and we debated this with the fishing
industry representatives yesterday, so I just wonder what the
idea is and why they are necessary.
Mr Anderson: There
are two types of impact assessment, as you have indicated, Chairman.
One would be strategic and the other would be the recommendation
in the Strategy Unit report relating to new types of fishing.
Q188 Chairman: What are
new types of fishing?
Mr Anderson: Well,
I think that is a very good question and the short answer is we
do not yet know how we are going to define that because, as I
am sure you have been advised by others, it is quite rare for
new fishing grounds to be discovered and the process of new fishing
techniques tends to be evolutionary, and quite how one decides
whether a new technique is a new technique or simply a development
of an existing technique is something that we are still considering.
Therefore, I cannot come to you with a neat and tidy answer, and
there may not be a neat and tidy answer, but it is again one of
those issues that we are working with the industry and other stakeholders
to consider. On the strategic assessments, it seems right in principle
that the impact of fishing along with all the other impacts on
the marine environment should be factored into an assessment process,
but again it is an area which is still the subject of debate and
discussion.
Q189 Chairman: I think
the industry is concerned that it should play a part in whatever
assessment is made, so will that be the case?
Mr Anderson: I
cannot see how they could be exempt from it, so the short answer
to that is yes.
Q190 Chairman: Well, that
is a nice Civil Service answer, but will they play a part?
Mr Bradshaw: Yes.
Q191 Alan Simpson: The
response to the suggestions about marine protected areas has been
very strong and positive from environmental organisations, but
more uncertain perhaps from the fishing organisations who have
said to us that they are not opposed in principle, but are opposed
to the idea of something that appeared arbitrary and ill-defined.
How would you see the criteria coming through in terms of designating
and defining protected areas?
Mr Bradshaw: We
have already said that we are, and I have been, very keen to develop
the concept of marine protected areas as long as they are based
on sound science. You are right that there is considerable evidence
now from examples in other parts of the world where marine protected
areas can play an important role in helping manage fish stocks
sustainably. I have to say that most of these areas are pretty
small and they do not involve the very migratory species of fish
that we have around our shores. We have in the UK at the moment
one example of a marine protected area which has been a resounding
success, and that is off the Lundy Island off the north coast
of Devon, but it is very small and it applies to shellfish, lobsters
and crabs which do not move around a great deal, but it has resulted
in a dramatic increase both in the number and the size of lobster
and crab inside the area and outside the area, and that is the
marine protected area concept. Now, we did have, I think, a marine
protected zone in the North Sea back in 2001 to try and protect
cod which was not deemed to be a success and if you look at other
countries that are a bit more similar to us, Iceland, for example,
has no protected zones in its fishery management, and although
the Icelanders, and I think the Faeroese similarly, would say
that they think they have had a beneficial effect, they have not
yet published any scientific analysis of that. Therefore, I think
whilst in principle I recognise that marine protected areas are
likely to play an increasingly important role in the sustainable
management of our marine environment, I think we have to be quite
careful about how we move forward on this. We are already actively
drawing up plans within the Department for a network of marine
protected areas in our own waters around the coast which I am
very keen to develop, but we are not talking about those of the
same size that were recommended yesterday and I think the impact
and any likely proposals to come out of the Commission later today
for next year need to be studied very carefully both to make sure
that they have scientific justification, but also to ensure that
they do not impact unnecessarily on the ability of the fishing
industry to exploit those stocks that are in very good shape,
like haddock, for example.
Q192 Alan Simpson: You
have started to take me towards my next question really which
is this: can we be clear about what the gap currently is between
our approach to protected areas at the moment and the proposed
closure of 30% of the economic zone recommended by the Royal Commission
because we need to be clear about whether we are talking even
on the same scale of protected areas or closed areas?
Mr Bradshaw: No,
we are not and I readily admit there is a gap, although the UK
is in the forefront of developing these ideas and indeed we intend
to make the whole concept of marine protected areas one of the
priorities of our Presidency of the EU in the second half of next
year to make progress on this EU-wide because, as your Chairman
made clear at the beginning, any marine protected areas of the
size and geographical location of those currently proposed by
the Royal Commission report would require support from all of
those countries that have an interest in those areas. We can do
more within our own waters, which is what we intend to do, and
we have been, for example, the first country to use the new powers
under the Habitats Directive to protect the Darwin Mounds and
I want to do more of that kind of thing. We are at the forefront
of this, but we are not yet at the stage, I do not believe, where
we can say that what the Royal Commission propose for our waters
or for the North Sea is something that we can, or should, move
to, and they themselves do not suggest that. The timetable they
were giving was ten years and, as I said yesterday, I think it
is important that we see first whether the tough and quite painful
decisions we have already taken are having the desired impact
before we decide whether or not to do anything more drastic.
Q193 Alan Simpson: How
close is the UK approach to protected areas to the EU concept
of a closed box scheme? Is the closed box scheme closer to where
we are now or is that in fact already moving towards the scale
of closure that is envisaged in the Royal Commission report?
Mr Bradshaw: I
really want to have a chance, and I am sure my officials would
too, to study whatever proposals the Commission comes out with
later today. My instinctive reaction is that, given that we are
two years into a cod recovery plan and we have already taken some
quite dramatic steps to reduce the pressure on cod and there are
signs of some slight cod recovery, albeit from a very low base,
I am not sure that tabling another radical change to our management
system two weeks before the December Council is likely to turn
out to be a flier. I say that without wanting to prejudge what
our response may be to whatever the Commission may propose and,
as I say, in principle we think that these sorts of protected
areas can play a very important role in managing fish stocks,
as does the fishing industry.
Q194 Alan Simpson: We
have had an interesting and specific question from the South Devon
and Channel Shellfishermen which is to say, "What will happen
to the UK protected areas once the derogation that we have for
the six- and twelve-mile limits cease to apply at the end of 2012?
Mr Bradshaw: It
will not. There is no support for that derogation not to continue.
That is another of these kinds of Europhobic myths that some politically
motivated people in our industry are very keen to throw around,
but if they can point to a single country or even approaching
a qualified majority of countries that want to do away with that
derogation, then the question might have some merit.
Q195 Chairman: What is
the relationship between the Royal Commission's closed areas and
the European Commission's closed areas? The Royal Commission's
proposals are bigger, I take it, and more firmly closed.
Mr Bradshaw: You
are putting me in a difficult position because we have not seen
the Commission's proposals yet, although we have some idea as
to what they are likely to be. I suspect that one of the differences
is that the Royal Commission is talking about no fishing of any
kind over quite large areas.
Q196 Chairman: Commercial
fishing out?
Mr Bradshaw: Yes,
whereas the Commission's proposals, I suspect, will have qualifications
in terms of different stocks. Is that your understanding, Rodney?
Mr Anderson: The
main differences, yes, but we simply do not know at this stage.
Q197 Chairman: But we
had a diagram last week from the Scottish Fishing Federation,
which was the French—
Mr Anderson: Well,
what we do not know, certainly what we do not know, is what is
the scientific basis for any proposal that the Commission may
be publishing today and it is very difficult to comment on a proposal
until you understand what it is there to achieve. Until we understand
what it is there to achieve, we are not in a position to comment
really, and there is a genuine difficulty here, nor are we able
to draw a comparison between what we believe the Commission may
be proposing and the kind of measures that have been set out in
yesterday's report because we have not had a chance either to
study in any depth, and you will appreciate that it is a very
long report, the very well-considered report which was produced
yesterday. We need to understand that report and what underpins
those recommendations. To answer your question in any sensible
way, we would have to understand both sides of that equation and
we do not.
Q198 Chairman: I accept
that. We had though a draft from the Scottish Fishermen's Federation
last week and I was concerned because it showed a small box of
Yorkshire and the Royal Commission had a huge box of Yorkshire
and I just wonder whether the Royal Commission's proposals are
kind of European Commission-plus or, as we put it in modern government
terminology, Euro-plus.
Mr Bradshaw: Well,
I am very pleased, Chairman, that the Commission's new spirit
of collaboration with the fishing industry means that they get
proposals before we do even if they are only in draft and if they
are given to them unofficially, but no, I think you are right.
If you listened to the interview which preceded mine on the Today
programme from John Farnell from the Commission, I think he described
the Royal Commission's proposals as a blunt instrument and it
would not be surprising if whatever are the Commission's proposals
were not as radical or as fundamental as what was contained there.
The Royal Commission's report is, after all, a long-term kind
of strategic let's-step-back-from-this-blue-skies-thinking report
and the Commission has to deal with the practicalities of December's
fisheries agreements.
Q199 Ms Atherton: Minister,
this is not exactly on the Strategy Unit, but linked to it. You
will be aware that there is great concern in Devon and Cornwall
about the situation of the dolphins and porpoises and that there
are reports of pair-trawlers actually within the twelve-mile limit
fishing as we speak. Can you give us some information about this?
Will you be raising the situation of the cetacean by-catch at
the Fisheries Council and have you provided scientific evidence
to the Commission to help them come to a conclusion to close this
fishery?
Mr Bradshaw: Yes,
is the answer to the last question. I have seen no evidence of
pair-trawling recommencing within our twelve-mile limit and I
personally spoke to the French Minister at the last Fisheries
Council and handed him a letter requesting French co-operation
in stopping pair-trawling within our twelve-mile limit and I regularly
raise the issue of cetacean by-catch both with the Commission
and with our European colleagues. I did so in my first meeting
with Joe Borg on his first day in his office as the new Commissioner
at the last Fisheries Council. Indirectly, the issue of bass pair-trawling
will come up because of course bass is not yet a quoted species,
but there may well be discussion of that, the level of the bass
stocks, so there may be an opportunity to raise it at the December
Council, although Ministers do have to consider quite carefully
at the December Council where they prioritise their talking time
with both the Commission and with fellow European Ministers, so
it may not be the best opportunity to raise the issue, but, as
you know, the UK has taken a lead on ensuring that the issue of
cetacean by-catch is on the EU agenda. We achieved this year for
the first time a programme to tackle it, although it did not go
as far as we would like or as quickly as we would like, but we
will certainly make sure that we keep the pressure up and do what
we can within our own waters to tackle what I recognise is a very
serious issue.
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