Brexit: Fisheries Management — House of Lords, 2018-03-20
Topic: Mixed Topics
John Eric Gardiner (Conservative, Centre-right): My Lords, with the leave of the House I shall repeat as a Statement an Answer given to an Urgent Question in the other place by my right honourable friend the Secretary of State for the Environment. The Statement is as follows: "Can I begin by paying tribute to the hard work of the Ministers and especially the civil servants of our country’s negotiating team, who this weekend concluded an agreement on the nature and length of the implementation period which will help us to prepare for life after Brexit? Taskforce 50, on behalf of the EU and our own team of dedicated civil servants, secured an agreed text which will now go to the March Council of the European Union, and after that Council at the end of this week, the Prime Minister will update the House on Monday The House will be aware that there are important legal and technical questions relating to fisheries management which mean that it occupies a special position in these negotiations. Both the EU and our own negotiators were always clear that specific arrangements would have to be agreed for fisheries. Our proposal to the EU was that, during the implementation period, we would sit alongside other coastal states as a third country and equal partner in annual quota negotiations and, in making that case, we did so after full consultation with representatives of the fisheries industry. We pressed hard during negotiations to secure this outcome and we are disappointed that the EU was not willing to move on this. However, thanks to the hard work of our negotiating team the text was amended from the original proposal and the Commission has agreed to amendments to the text which provide additional reassurance. The revised text clarifies that the UK’s share of quotas will not change during the implementation period and that the UK can attend international negotiations. Furthermore, the agreement includes an obligation on both sides to act in good faith throughout the implementation period. Any attempts by the EU to operate in a way which would harm the fishing industry would breach that obligation and, of course, these arrangements will only apply to negotiations in December 2019. We are at the table as a full member state for negotiations in December 2018 and, critically, in December 2020 we will be negotiating fishing opportunities as a third country and independent coastal state, deciding who can access our waters and on what terms for the first time in over 40 years It is important that we use this transition period to ensure that we can negotiate in 2020, as a third country and independent coastal state, to maximise the benefits for our coastal communities; that we can control who accesses our waters and on what terms; and that we manage our marine resources sustainably. And we are already looking at a range of data to support consideration of future fishing opportunities, including the nature of catches and zonal attachment of stocks in the UK exclusive economic zone. There is a significant prize at the end of the implementation period, and it is important that all of us in every area accept that the implementation period is a necessary step towards securing that prize. For our coastal communities, it is an opportunity to revive economically. For our marine environment, it is an opportunity to be managed sustainably, and it is critical that all of us, in the interests of the whole nation, keep our eyes on that prize".