A focus on the future for fishing

That the last twelve months have been tough for Banff & Buchan’s fishing industry is something that will not come as news to anyone. The economic problems that have affected so many businesses have not spared the already hard pressed fishing industry, with many skippers and processors feeling the squeeze. However, despite the immediate challenges the industry faces, the past year has also been a time when discussions on the future of fishing have been at the forefront of many people’s minds.

The EU’s Common Fisheries Policy has been an abject failure since its inception, neither preventing a decline in fish stocks nor supporting fishing as a viable industry. Annual gladiatorial battles between member states over quotas have seen rigid and inappropriate measures introduced to mixed fisheries and have left skippers unable to plan their livelihoods with any degree of certainty.

Yet at last there is the possibility of change, with the EU having accepted that the CFP must be reformed. Although it will not happen overnight, discussions are currently in full swing in Brussels and in fishing communities across Europe about what kind of model should replace the CFP.

An over-centralised approach has been at the heart of the CFP’s failure to secure a sustainable, profitable fishing industry in Scotland, and I am in no doubt that what replaces it must see responsibility for managing fisheries returned to Europe’s nations, working together on a regional basis. Fundamental to this is the protection of historical fishing rights, to ensure that decisions are taken as close to where it matters as possible.

Ending these historical rights could see a free-for-all in Scotland’s waters and threaten the livelihoods of many people in Banff & Buchan’s fishing industry, yet that is exactly what the UK Government has recently sought to do by recommending that MEPs back the abolition of historical fishing rights. It is the action of a Government that does not understand the fishing industry and does not care for its future, yet it is what we have come to expect from administrations of varying political hues in London over the years.

Banff & Buchan’s fishing industry and the hard working men and woman in it need their voices to be heard in Europe, particularly as high stakes discussions on the future of the CFP are being held. However, as long as the UK is responsible for discussions with Europe, that voice will never be heard as effectively as it should be. Banff & Buchan’s fishing industry needs a distinctive Scottish voice in Europe to fight its corner, a voice that will only come with Scottish independence.

The Scottish Government and my SNP colleagues in the European Parliament are clear about the need for a return to regional management of fisheries, based on historical fishing rights and will continue to do all that they can to see that brought about. Working together, the Scottish Government and Scotland’s fishing industry are better placed to find solutions to the challenge of managing fish stocks than centralised decision making in Brussels ever could be.

The Scottish fishing fleet has been at the forefront of introducing innovative conservation measures to try and increase the sustainability of the industry while maintaining its future as a profitable venture, demonstrating just how effectively Scotland could manage its own fisheries. The challenge is now to ensure that we are given the opportunity to do so.