Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1-19)
MR BEN
BRADSHAW MP, MR
SIMON WATERFIELD
AND MS
FIONA WALTERS
24 JANUARY 2007
Q1 Chairman: Good afternoon. Welcome,
Minister. You might want to introduce your team before we start
and, if you do not mind, then we will just go straight into questioning?
Mr Bradshaw: Thank
you very much, Chairman. Simon Waterfield, on my right, is from
our Fisheries Division and Fiona Walters, on my left, is from
our Parliamentary Division and we are at your service.
Q2 Chairman: The first topic we want
to deal with and the one for which originally the Committee suggested
we call you in is the problem of ministerial overrides of scrutiny
reserves. The most recent information we have from the Prime Minister's
EU Adviser, who supplied the statistics, was that Defra has a
higher proportion of scrutiny overrides than any other comparable
department. Also fisheries has been a particular problem area,
which is sensitive for a number of members of this Committee,
including one instance where a debate recommendation was outstanding
when a decision was agreed to by yourself. Can you explain why
this should be so in Defra and how you, or your team, intend to
improve matters?
Mr Bradshaw: I can tell you, Chairman,
that I think, since those figures were considered and which were
for the first six months of the year, it is no longer the case
that Defra is the worst government department and certainly we
regret any instance in which we have to override scrutiny. I have
prepared for the benefit of your Committee a useful table, which
with your indulgence I am happy to pass round to your members,
which lists every example of override which happened over 2006
and gives a brief reason for it, which I am happy to go into in
more detail.[1]
It may also be helpful for your Committee to be aware that we
submitted about 170 Explanatory Memoranda in 2006, of which approximately
108 were legislative proposals, and during 2006 we used the parliamentary
scrutiny override seven times in the Commons and eight times in
the Lords. Five of the overrides in the Commons were on fisheries
proposals and three of the overrides in the Lords were on fisheries
proposals. If you compare that with 2005, when a similar number
of EM were submitted, Defra Ministers used the parliamentary scrutiny
override 16 times, so more than twice as many times in 2005 as
2006, in the Commons, and 14 times in the Lords; four of those
were related to fisheries and two in the Lords were related to
fisheries. I appreciate that Committees are naturally unhappy
when overrides happen, but the record for 2006 is a considerable
improvement on 2005. The reasons for overrides, which I think
we have communicated on before, basically are three-fold. One
is that we send you an EM, to which then you have further questions,
which then we have to go back either to the Commission or to the
devolves or to other government departments, to try to get answers
or clarification on, and that does not always arrive in time.
Another issue is parliamentary recesses; if a document arrives
in a parliamentary recess, that can mean sometimes that you do
not get the opportunity to scrutinise it in time. In a small number
of cases, particularly on Defra issues which are not only issues
of general EU competence but also issues of devolved subjects,
on fisheries and agriculture and environment, we need to work
closely and sometimes it takes some time to reach an agreed position
not only with other government departments but also with the devolved
administrations. That is a brief summary of why unfortunately
it has been necessary in that small number of cases to have a
scrutiny override.
Chairman: If you do not mind me saying
so, you are a former member of the Committee, you know how the
Committee works and when the Committee decides that something
has to be debated it is clear that we are saying that, in any
debates we have, every Member of Parliament has a right to attend.
We are given that responsibility, therefore, because we think
of the seriousness of the subject to the whole of Parliament.
To take a decision when that debate is outstanding is not something
that many ministers would choose to do; in fact, all the time
I have been on this Committee, which is eight years, it is a matter
which happens only very, very infrequently. It says something
not just about your priorities vis-a"-vis this Committee
but the whole Parliament, and that I think is what the concern
is in the end. Though it is getting better, I think it has to
be very important for ministries and ministers to be able to say
to their colleagues "There is an outstanding parliamentary
debate on this issue and therefore I cannot override the scrutiny
reserve." Having done so, obviously, we would not wish to
see it happen again. Mr Robertson, you wanted to come in.
Q3 Angus Robertson: Welcome, Minister,
to the Committee. I want to ask a very specific question about
Council of Ministers proceedings, because usually you are accompanied
by the Scottish Executive Minister for Rural Affairs. You may
be aware that this week saw the publication of a report by a former
senior UKRep official, now Head of the Scottish Executive Office
in Brussels, Mr Aron. He writes: "UK Ministers take the lead
in negotiating on behalf of the UK whilst Executive Ministers
simply watch proceedings from the sidelines. Unfortunate examples
are where there is no seat for the Minister in the Council room
during the meeting so they have to follow discussions from the
salle d'écoute alongside officials." If you
do not know the answer to the question, could you ask your advisers
to help you with this, because I am certain that this will become
a matter of public record. Has this ever occurred to the Scottish
Executive Minister for Rural Affairs?
Mr Bradshaw: It did not occur
at all in 2006. Sometimes it occurs when, for example, in the
end game of the fisheries negotiations, to reach agreement on
a very difficult dossier, the room is emptied of everybody except
one minister for each country, so no officials and nobody else.
That has happened only once in my four years' experience. I suggest
you put the same question to my colleague, Mr Finnie, because
we work extremely closely, and I do not recognise accuracy at
all in those comments that you have just quoted, Mr Robertson,
of how we work together with our devolved colleagues during fisheries
negotiations. Mr Finnie and I work extremely closely together.
He is always in the room unless, as I say, the room goes down
to one minister per country, and that has happened only once.
Q4 Angus Robertson: To clarify this,
you are confirming that there has been a case where Ross Finnie,
the Scottish Executive Minister for Fisheries, has had to follow
proceedings from the salle d'écoute; this is the
Minister in question?
Mr Bradshaw: If my recollection
is correct, there has been one instance, in all of the Council
negotiations that I have been involved in, where each country's
delegation has been reduced to a single minister. That has required
the Minister for Northern Ireland, the Minister in Scotland, the
officials from Wales and any other devolved ministers from other
EU countries also to leave the main negotiating area. That is
the nature sometimes of negotiations, that negotiations come down
to one person, one on one; so that situation is avoidable but,
as I say, it has happened once.
Angus Robertson: That is a `yes'?
Chairman: I think it is a clarification,
it is a detail and I would say that was much more than a `yes'.
I think it was a very good explanation.
Q5 Mr Heathcoat-Amory: Returning
to the general issue of the scrutiny overrides, the performance
of your Department actually is lamentable and it completely contradicts
the assurances we are always given by ministers actually to involve
national parliaments better. Can I draw your attention to the
Amsterdam Treaty Protocol; this Protocol was designed, and I quote:
"to encourage greater involvement of national parliaments
in the activities of the European Union and to enhance their ability
to express their views on matters which may be of particular interest
to them." The same Protocol, which is now part of Community
law, requires documents to be made available in good time and
actually mentions a six-week minimum time period between a proposal
being available to ministers and it being put on the agenda of
a Council meeting. Is it that the European Union institutions,
the Commission, and so on, are breaking this Protocol, or is it
incompetence in your Department not to give us the adequate time
to debate these matters before you take the decisions: which is
it?
Mr Bradshaw: My colleague, Fiona,
will correct me if I am wrong. I think I am right in saying that
of the examples which are in front of you here, of the overrides
from 2006, there was only one where the reason for the override
was the Commission breaking the six-week rule, and that was a
relatively minor one. I will be quite honest with you, Mr Connarty,
we always face a judgment, as a Department, as to whether an issue
is serious enough, or we consider it serious enough, to expend
capital and negotiating capital with the Commission and other
Member States by holding it up until the next Council, which we
would be perfectly entitled to do, and we do on some occasions,
or whether we allow that one through. For the most serious, the
reasons for override, in the cases certainly that we are discussing
from last year, were either the fact that there were problems
with recess or proroguing of Parliament intervening, or that the
discussions within Government to reach an agreed position on an
issue, such as the EU-Morocco Fisheries Agreement, or discussions
with the devolved administrations, in this case Scotland, such
as the Deep Sea Fish Species Agreement, were not resolved in time
for the timetable of your Committee to enable that proposal to
be scrutinised.
Q6 Mr Heathcoat-Amory: Chairman,
I am sorry, I do not think that is adequate. You have agreed that
on one occasion the Commission broke the Protocol; is this Treaty
law, negotiated and signed by the Prime Minister? You are telling
us that they broke the law and you did nothing about it; so what
weight do we put on all these assurances about the involvement
of national parliaments? They are completely worthless, if our
own ministers, in our own departments, do not object, and there
is no indication that you did even object. Can you give us, in
future, an assurance that when they break their own law you will
refuse to agree to matters and it will be brought to the attention
of this Committee?
Mr Bradshaw: I think it would
be wrong to describe it as a strict law, Chairman.
Q7 Mr Heathcoat-Amory: It is a Protocol;
it is part of the Treaty?
Mr Bradshaw: Yes, exactly; and
certainly, if we felt that the subject was worthy of objecting
to, we would do so. As I say, the only one, with the exception
of the December Council, on quotas regulation, which I think the
Committee acknowledges is a special case and always has been,
given the timetable of the Fisheries Council, the scientific advice
and the Commission's proposals, was, I think it was, the oil-seed
rape one, the persistent organic pollutants issue. That was one
where we felt no other Member State was objecting to it coming
to that Council, and sometimes we have to strike a balance as
to whether we think an issue is worth objecting to, or whether,
on balance, it is not controversial, no other Member State is
going to object to it in its substance, so our kicking up a fuss,
if you like, is not going to achieve anything and would expend
goodwill and negotiating capital with other Member States and
with the Commission.
Q8 Mr Cash: Minister, as a former
co-member of this Committee, what the Chairman said at the beginning
is important, because we know that you know exactly how all these
things operate. You have heard us, and you have taken part in
proceedings in the past regarding fisheries questions when you
were sitting in the position as a member of the Committee. It
is a question not just of timing, or recess, or consensus, it
is substantive issues, and the bottom line is that some are more
important than others, and I think it would be foolish for anyone
to take a position on the override when the Minister could explain
afterwards, unless it was a matter of importance. What worries
a lot of us is simply that we know you know what the ball-game
is, so when there is fiddling, or manoeuvring, or deliberate readjustment
of timetables from within the system, you know what is going on.
For example, to take an instance of the Council Regulation establishing
EC Financial Measures for the Implementation of Fisheries Policy,
both Committees, so it is not just the Commons, it is the Lords
as well, are considering the matter. It says, I think disingenuously,
"These issues did not become clearer until late in the negotiations
and there was insufficient time for the Committees to consider
this information." Quite bluntly, I do not buy that. You
know what is going on, your officials know what is going on, it
is a tricky question, and, to put it bluntly, in my opinion, it
is organising timetables in a way which does not give the parliamentarians
in the House of Commons who are going to consider these matters
in Standing Committee, which includes all those Members other
than us and including us, the opportunity to ask questions. I
think that demonstrates a failure at the heart of Government,
which is to give due regard to Westminster and too much regard
to what is convenient for the purposes of the European Commission
at the expense of, in this case, British fishermen. What is your
comment on that?
Mr Bradshaw: I think you have
chosen a very helpful example, if I may say so, Mr Cash, and indeed
you could have chosen the one below it, on the European Fisheries
Fund. You are right, these are both issues which have been around
for a long time, and, in fact, I must have done certainly more
than one scrutiny debate on the European Fisheries Fund. The reason
these are good examples that you have chosen is that often when
negotiations, the end-game of negotiations, if you like, revolve
around money, and the European Union Member States, as a group,
are deciding on how much or how big a fund should be, or how much
should be expended, those decisions really are made in the end-game
of negotiation, involving the ministers at the Council meeting.
I do not think it would be fair to suggest that we had not kept
the Committee informed of the progress of those negotiations,
which, as I say, had been going on not for months but for years,
and the UK Government position on them had not changed, our position
had been consistent all the way through. Really at every turn
of the debate, if you like, if we were not communicating then
scrutiny debates were being held and I was being held to account
not just by members of this Committee, but any Member, as Mr Connarty
reflected earlier, is entitled to attend. Sometimes we cannot
be certain ourselves. You may think that we know what is going
on, or our officials know what is going on, or what other governments'
positions are, but, as somebody who is a very experienced politician,
I am sure you will appreciate that negotiation often can be about
not revealing your full hand until the last minute, particularly
when you are talking about establishing building coalitions, blocking
minorities, qualified majorities, and so forth.
Q9 Chairman: One final question lies
unanswered, I think. You have made your excuses. I am not sure
that the Committee is in a position to assess whether those excuses
are valid reasons or not, and I am sure when our officials read
the script they will go and check to see whether, in fact, in
all of these situations, as you say, the UK position had not changed
and there was nothing to report which was different. I am sure
the officials will do that assessment. How do you intend to improve
matters? It is not good enough to say it was a very bad year last
year and it has been just a less bad year this year. Statistically,
you are still worse than any other department of a comparable
size.
Mr Bradshaw: I think you will
find we are not, Chairman, when the figures for 2006 are finally
published; you are correct in saying, I think, for the first half
of the year we were. That is to do partly with the fact that so
many long-standing fisheries items, rather like London buses,
all came along at once. As I said, we have improved dramatically
since 2005. We have more than halved the number of scrutiny overrides,
partly as a result of the efforts which have been put in by Defra
staff; we will continue to try to improve. We will consider certainly
the suggestion that Mr Heathcoat-Amory has made, about whether
we should be less reluctant to insist on the six-week rule, but
as I indicated, quite fully, I think, in my response to him, these
things are always a balance, that in the end one has to make a
judgment as to where one thinks the United Kingdom's best interests
lie. I hope that, if you ask to see me in a year's time, in front
of your Committee again, we will be able to show further improvement.
Q10 Chairman: Thank you. We will
move on to our second topic, on which we informed you we would
take evidence. I first wrote to Lord Rooker on 25 October about
making a link between whaling and the proposed concessions between
the Community and Iceland, and you and I have exchanged a number
of letters on this matter since. In your latest letter, of 11
January, which we have before us, you drew attention to Iceland's
request to extend these tariff concessions to include whale meat,
breaching the International Convention on Whaling not only by
recommencing whaling but also by wanting to sell it in the EU.
What is the latest position on this issue?
Mr Bradshaw: The latest position,
I am pleased to inform the Committee, is that, thanks to an eagle-eyed
Defra official, who spotted the inclusion of whale meat in this
trade agreement, we raised our concerns, and I would like to thank
the Committee as well for raising this as an issue with me and
with your fellow committees in the European Union; the Commission
had not spotted this. When it was drawn to their attention, they
were as concerned as we were about it and they have successfully
persuaded Iceland to withdraw any reference to whale meat from
this agreement, in the last few days. We are grateful to you for
your input and we are very pleased with the outcome.
Q11 Mr Borrow: Minister, on the broader
issue of trade preferences, I think in an earlier letter to us,
at the back end of last year, you said that you did not see the
issue of trade preferences being one which should be used directly
in terms of Iceland's policy on whaling. The Committee are somewhat
puzzled as to why that should be the position of Defra?
Mr Bradshaw: I can understand
the Committee's puzzlement, Chairman, and I raised exactly the
same questions, because I do not think anybody can be left in
any doubt of the UK's very strong anti-whaling position. We were
in the forefront of international diplomatic protests against
Iceland when it resumed that commercial whaling, in disregard
of the international moratorium. We led an international demarche.
I summoned the Icelandic Ambassador. The Committee may be interested
to know that there has been a sea change in media opinion in Iceland
since the resumption of commercial whaling. The main Icelandic
newspaper, which used to be fairly supportive of the Government's
position on whaling, is now highly critical. The Government itself
is divided. There is quite a heated debate in Iceland, sparked
partly by the international protests which we led. When I asked
the question "Is there any more we can do?" thinking,
in this respect, of the trade preference, the very strong advice,
from our lawyers, other government departments, DTI and FCO, was
that not only would it be not sensible but also not legal to try
to block a trade agreement because one disagreed with an aspect
of a country's domestic policy. It is also worth pointing out
to the Committee, I think, that Iceland has a significant trade
deficit with the European Union so we benefit from the liberalisation
of trade with Iceland. As I say, when we spotted this rather surprising
and bizarre inclusion of whale meat in the list of items that
they wanted included in the agreement, which would have been illegal
under international law, it is illegal to trade whale meat under
IC's law, thankfully we spotted it. It would have been very embarrassing
if we had not and if it had gone through and we had signed up
to such an agreement, so I am extremely thankful to the eagle-eyed
official in my Department who spotted it, who has done not only
this country but the EU a great service.
Q12 Chairman: I think we would all
echo that. Our original concern obviously was on whaling and we
still have that concern. The point made by Mr Borrow, you chose
to write back and say that an Environmental Council would be raising
bottom trawling as the main point of interest. It did seem to
us at that time—I know that legally, as you said, we could
not do anything to stop them—that the idea of just putting
it to the side for some other issue did strike us as being not
appropriate. I think we have reflected probably Parliament's very,
very strong majority feeling that we should do everything possible
to stop whaling by Iceland or any other country. Why did you choose
that other item rather than choosing to keep the whaling issue
on the agenda at the Environment Council?
Mr Bradshaw: I do not think one
should belittle the importance, in environmental terms, of destructive
bottom trawling, Chairman, but actually we raised both. We raised
whaling and bottom trawling at separate Councils when they were
the most topical issue, and indeed we got very strong support
in the Environment Council when we raised the issue of whaling,
although I am afraid that a stronger declaration by the Commission
was objected to by Denmark. Both issues are very important. The
only other important matter I think I ought to draw to your attention
is that there is a difference between whaling and bottom trawling,
in that whaling is not an EU competence whereas international
fisheries is, so there is a slight legalistic difference there
as well.
Q13 Angus Robertson: We are all aware
that Icelanders are fierce defenders of their national interest,
having won the cod war, for example. What do you think are the
reasons behind their change of heart on this issue which was raised,
about the inclusion of whale meat and their withdrawal?
Mr Bradshaw: I am afraid I do
not have any information on that, Chairman, and probably it is
a question which is best put to the Icelandic Ambassador or to
the Icelandic Government in a letter. I do not know, for example,
when this was drawn to their attention, whether there was any
embarrassment, or even what their motives were for putting it
on the list. What I do know is that when we raised it the Commission
were also very concerned about it, they raised it with Iceland
and Iceland agreed to withdraw it.
Q14 Mr Cash: In the context of your
explanation of the spotting by this official and our having raised
it and the question of illegality, there is a very important underlying
question here, I think you will agree, which is, there are circumstances
in which national interest can prevail, and we know what the Icelandic
people want most on the whaling issue. Do you agree that it is
feasible, and sometimes desirable, to override the requirements
of Section 2 of the European Communities Act 1972 in the national
interests of the United Kingdom and/or, for that matter, any other
country, in pursuit of their national interest, because there
are circumstances which lead sometimes to disputes with this Committee
or with Parliament as a whole? In principle, do you refute the
suggestion that we could override Regulations and/or Directives
in our own national interest?
Mr Bradshaw: I am sure there are
circumstances when we might consider doing so, Chairman, but I
am not such an avid student of the various bits of European law
to which the Honourable Member refers. Perhaps he could explain
what Section 2, of whatever it was he was referring to, actually
is.
Mr Cash: Basically, it is that we accept
treaties and obligations which arise under the European Communities
Act 1972 which have been agreed in the Council of Ministers and
through treaties. There are circumstances where, for example,
it is clear that, short of arriving at a consensus, there is an
option and that is to say, "No, we're not going to agree
to this law."
Q15 Chairman: Mr Cash, it is an interesting
idea. I do not think really it is for this Minister to answer.
Mr Bradshaw: I will try to answer
it, if you like, Chairman. I genuinely believe that if one signs
up to treaties one adheres to them.
Chairman: I think we will move on from
that. We wish to move now to measures agreed by the Council on
total allowable catches, if you will, Minister; but still on whaling,
if you wish, Mr Heathcoat-Amory.
Q16 Mr Heathcoat-Amory: If I may,
I would like to commend the Minister for the successful outcome
to this particular spat over whale meat. I certainly believe that
we should not allow trade liberalisation to get too contaminated
by what essentially is a separate issue, particularly when it
is illegal anyway, to import the meat; so I think that is good.
Can I widen it slightly and suggest to the Minister that we have
got a lot to learn from Iceland over fisheries conservation. I
have been there numerous times and I am impressed by their rivers
and the way they conserve their stocks. Is there a danger that
the whaling issue could come back to be an impediment to what
should be a very friendly interchange of information and practical
conservation measures between Iceland, the Government there, and
ourselves? Can I encourage you to build on this, and watch trade
liberalisation but get together on marine conservation issues?
Mr Bradshaw: Yes, and I agree
entirely with Mr Heathcoat-Amory, Chairman. He is absolutely right,
that although we have very, very strong and serious differences
with Iceland over whaling we co-operate very well on a whole range
of issues. The Icelanders own significant parts of our economy,
in retail, Hamley's and some of our other favourite stores are
in the hands of Icelanders, and we do learn and will continue
to learn from their fisheries policies. We are in the process
of reviewing our quota management regime, which you may be aware
of, and I have also visited Iceland on a number of occasions and
am very keen to learn from the best practice wherever we can find
it internationally, including from Iceland.
Q17 Chairman: Sometimes I think,
Minister, that it is always after the event hindsight is a wonderful
thing. I do think it was a Conservative Government which gave
sole competence to the EU over our fisheries, which I think causes
as much concern among Scottish Labour Members as any other party,
as we know. As you say, when we sign treaties then we live by
them, and often that is the problem, that we have signed the treaty
regardless of the Government's political persuasion at the time.
Can I move on to total allowable catches. When I was reading Sir
Malcolm Rifkind today, in the House Magazine, I thought that was
very interesting. On total allowable catches, Minister, if we
can start with the way in which the Community agrees total allowable
catches each year, this has long been a source of concern, as
you know, because of its effect on parliamentary scrutiny. You
have referred in your previous answers to the speed with which
decisions come to the fore. We note that there has been an improvement
in the case of deep-sea stocks and those in the Baltic, but not
yet for the main stocks of interest to the UK. It does seem there
is progress in the timescales for one sector but not for us. Is
there a likelihood of an earlier discussion and conclusion, which
would allow us to participate in scrutiny, in the next year's
round, for example, in the stocks available and of interest to
the UK?
Mr Bradshaw: Chairman, we are
always looking at opportunities to increase front-loading, which
is this horrible term which we use to express bringing forward
recommendations earlier. The difficulty with any of the species,
if not all of the species, which are of main interest to the UK,
is that also we want to make the judgment based on the latest
available scientific advice on the spawning mass, and clearly
that depends on the spawning season. Probably it is not possible
for most of the stocks in which the UK has an interest to have
the scientific advice for that year any earlier than currently
is the case, and that does present us, as you rightly say, with
a significant challenge in the autumn, where there is a very tight
schedule between the scientific advice being published, the Commission
coming forward with its proposals and the December Council. Although,
as I am sure you appreciate, we do attempt, and I think at least
for every year that I have been Fisheries Minister, to hold a
debate on the floor of the House after we have received the first
proposals, to give all Members of this House an opportunity to
debate the issue before I go to Council.
Q18 Angus Robertson: Turning to a
little bit more detail on total allowable catches, your colleague,
Ross Finnie, tabled an answer in the Scottish Parliament yesterday
in detail about this, so it is a matter of record what has happened
to the different species and on the days at sea. In his answer,
interestingly, he says that some of these decisions were disappointing.
Do you know what those might have been, disappointing for him,
or what was disappointing for you?
Mr Bradshaw: I think that what
was most disappointing about the final result of this year's negotiations,
in terms of days at sea, was that we did not feel that enough
differentiation was made between the reduction in days at sea
for our white-fish fleet, which generally uses a bigger mesh size,
and the reduction in the smaller mesh-size fleet, which would
include the Dutch beam trawlers, for example, which catch significant
amounts of white fish, including cod as a bycatch. We have made
the argument very forcefully in the past that, because of the
reductions which have already been achieved in the UK fleet, amounting
to about 60% in terms of effort on cod, it was time that the Commission
turned its attention to other sectors in other countries which
still had not contributed that level to the cod recovery programme.
Having said that, we did manage to reverse the Commission's original
proposal; their original proposal was to cut the small-mesh Dutch
fleet less, significantly less, than ours and actually we ended
up with ours being cut the least. Although we were still disappointed
with that, it was a significantly better outcome than I think
most people had dared to hope.
Q19 Jim Dobbin: I think the Minister
has touched on this area and the question really is about the
days at sea provision and the limited period which appears to
be on the agenda, which seems to have attracted as much attention
as the TACs. Can you say why that was and can you explain the
relationship between the two?
Mr Bradshaw: The relationship
between the two is that the TACs are about the total amount of
fish that you are allowed to land of a particular species, and
the days at sea are about the number of days that you are allowed
to go out and fish, and fisheries management, whether here or
in other parts of the world, generally is based on a combination
of those two controls. Given the still very worrying state of
the cod stock, particularly in the North Sea, around the UK coast,
the advice from the international scientists for the fifth year
running is that there should be no cod caught at all. The Commission
came forward with recommendations for a 25% cut in both the days
at sea and the TACs, and we ended up with a cut in the TACs of
around 14% and a cut in the days at sea of between 4%/5% for our
own fleet and 7%/8% for other countries' fleets. That gives you
a broad picture, I think, of why the Commission felt it had to
recommend that level of reductions and where we ended up. You
are all experienced Members to know that wherever one ends up
in these negotiations one tends to get criticised, by the fishing
industry or by the environmentalists, for having done either too
much or too little, so that can be a bit of a thankless task.
I think we ended up with an outcome which was responsible. I think
it would have been irresponsible and unrealistic to expect no
further reduction in pressure on cod, given the still very parlous
state of the stock and the independent scientific advice. Yet
we did manage, again, I think, to fight for a relatively good
deal for our own industry.
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