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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Richard Benyon)
I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Southend West (Mr Amess) for speaking with passion about his friend and constituent and about the fishing industry and representing, like many hon. Members, his local fishing community.
I will talk about the Marine Management Organisation, how it works and how we try to regulate fisheries. I will also briefly touch on how I, as the Fisheries Minister, am trying to improve the lot of the under-10-metre fishermen and the entire fleet with different activities that we are taking in the Department, to see a reversal in the decline of a once-noble industry.
From my conversations with fishermen around the country, one message that they are keen to relay is that those who commit fisheries offences are taking fish from their fellow fishermen; I am making a general comment here about those who land black fish, not a specific one. It is vital that we do all that we can to achieve compliance with the law and to protect fish stocks and the livelihoods of legitimate fishermen from criminal activities that affect them. If fish are landed illegally and sold, they are black fish and their value is stolen from legitimate fisherman. I make that point unashamedly to the whole fishing industry across all the United Kingdom’s waters and all the EU’s waters, for which I take my responsibility as the UK Fisheries Minister seriously.
Decisions on the investigation and prosecution of fisheries offences are not taken by me or my officials, as my hon. Friend rightly pointed out. To maintain fish stocks, laws are set at European and national levels. We could have a debate about that, and I would probably start at the position taken by him and many other hon. Members that one would not start from here, and we want to see some changes. However, the MMO has the duty to enforce those laws.
I have spoken before and often about the difficult decisions the MMO has had to make. The MMO is a measured and proportionate organisation in its approach, with a strong commitment to transparency and impartiality. I will explain why. Enforcement action against illegal activity on our seas is one of many activities the MMO undertakes. It may be useful if I provide a brief overview of the legal framework within which those decisions are taken. I urge all hon. Members who have fishing interests in constituencies that are potentially affected by the MMO’s rulings to make contact either with their local MMO officer or to visit its headquarters in Newcastle, as I have done on a number of occasions. I urge them to do that because they will see a committed organisation trying to do its best in a complicated world, where the vast majority of fishermen do good, but some sadly do not.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
The Minister had an opportunity to visit Portavogie in my constituency the week before last. He had the chance to meet some of the people who have the 10-metre-and-under boat size. They expressed to him their concerns about the bureaucracy and the system whereby the proceeds of crime are used against them. Was the Minister able to give them some comfort on the days that he met them? If so, what was the outcome?
Richard Benyon
I hope that I will be able to give the hon. Gentleman some comfort when I discuss how the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 is—although it usually is not—involved in the prosecution of fishermen when illegality or bad maladministration has taken place.
For all its faults and vices, the EU fisheries control regulation requires all member states to have an effective, proportionate and dissuasive system of administrative and criminal sanctions, which should effectively deprive those responsible of the economic benefit derived from their infringement.
Sheryll Murray
Will the Minister confirm that the same penalties will apply to a fisherman who is a member of a producer organisation as to a fisherman who is operating under the MMO’s own system with an under-10-metre vessel?
Richard Benyon
Absolutely. No distinction is made between size of vessel, who owns the vessel or where the fishing opportunity rests.
The regulation goes on to say that sanctions must be capable of producing results proportionate to the seriousness of such infringements, thereby effectively discouraging further offences of the same kind. It also says that member states may apply a system whereby a fine is proportionate to the turnover of the business, or to the financial advantage achieved or envisaged by committing the infringement. That is the background against which the MMO must operate. I urge my hon. Friend the Member for Southend West to read the MMO’s compliance and enforcement strategy, which it published on its website last autumn. That demonstrates its practical approach in helping people to achieve compliance.
As I have already said, my officials and I are not involved in operational decisions relating to fisheries investigation cases, and it would not be right for me to offer solutions or direction on the case my hon. Friend has raised or on any other case. However, I will say that the MMO does not take decisions to prosecute fish merchants or fishermen lightly. I have looked into the matter in great detail. The MMO is astute and recognises that the vast majority of the fishing industry is compliant with the rules that govern it and that only a small percentage break the law. The MMO understands that education, guidance and advice is the best approach to achieving compliance in the fishing industry in most cases.
Decisions to prosecute are taken only when all other efforts to achieve compliance have been exhausted, or the nature of offending is on such a scale or is so persistent that prosecution is the only appropriate action available. The MMO will only prosecute fisheries offences after careful and detailed consideration of the relative involvement of individual offenders. In every case, the MMO will scrutinise the seriousness of the alleged offences detected and select the most appropriate course of action. In serious cases, where people are found guilty of criminal offences, their behaviour may warrant a confiscation order, so that the money made from their criminal activity is returned to the public purse. I hope that I am explaining how the system works.
Mr Alan Campbell (Tynemouth) (Lab)
My fishermen believe in the rule of law as much as anyone else and would want those who benefit from criminality to lose the proceeds that they get from that. However, their view is that, in these instances, the response is wholly disproportionate. They are also concerned that education is one thing, but trying to govern law-abiding fishermen through fear is entirely different.
Richard Benyon
I thank the hon. Gentleman for making that point. I reassure him that I want to make sure that all the sanctions are applied proportionately. My hon. Friend the Member for Southend West has asked me to reflect. I always reflect on what he says because he puts it with such force and panache. I will also reflect on what the hon. Member for Tynemouth (Mr Campbell) has brought to this debate and ensure that we can reassure his constituents. The MMO should use the Proceeds of Crime Act 2002 sparingly. It has done so on only five occasions in the past 12 months of its existence. Only two of the cases were fish dealers, who were significantly mis-recording the landing and selling of quota species.
The MMO uses the 2002 Act where a prosecutor who, by law, acts independently of the Government and the MMO considers action under that Act is necessary to remove the unlawful benefit to deter similar offending fishermen. Those two Proceeds of Crime Act cases are unusual, and the MMO’s approach to compliance, as I stated before, is ordinarily via education and guidance. For example, in 2011, the MMO carried out 2,862 vessel inspections, and the majority of infringements detected resulted in the MMO offering oral advice to achieve compliance on 396 separate occasions. Some 83 written warnings were issued and seven financial administrative penalties were levied. Only 22 prosecution cases were brought, only two of which resulted in confiscation orders such as those that we are discussing today.
As my hon. Friend the Member for Southend West says, I cannot go into the details of the case. However, in the case of Mr Gilson, who is both a fisherman and a buyer and seller of fish, the court felt that the financial benefit of almost £425,000 that was omitted should result in a repayment by Mr Gilson of £395,000. That sounds like a lot of money, but it is proportionate in relation to the amount that was admitted.
In the few minutes I have left, I will respond to the other issues. One of the criticisms of the fishing industry is that we are harder on our own fishermen than we are on overseas fishermen. The biggest order under the 2002 Act was for £1,163,000, which related to a foreign fishing vessel that was fishing illegally. Another case of interest was a fishing boat that was unlicensed. It was nicking fish from our fishermen, and it was prosecuted by the MMO, to the applause and gratitude of the fishermen in that area.
I have said that I will reflect on the points that my hon. Friend raised, and I will. I urge him to look at the proposals that we are making to improve the lot of the under-10-metre fleet. That involves taking quota that is unused by other elements of the fleet and using it to supplement the under-10-metre fleet, which, as he rightly says, receives an unfair allocation. The statistically correct figure is 4%. The 96% that the larger sector has includes some stocks that the under-10-metre sector would never access because they are so far away. However, statistically, he is right. I want to correct the unfairness that he has so eloquently pointed out. That is why, in the next few weeks, we will be making proposals that will lead to enhanced fishing opportunities for the under-10-metre fleet in three or four pilot projects around the country.
We have employed people to assist in ensuring that the relevant quota reaches the fishermen who deserve it and that the transfer of unused quota will mean there is a fairer allocation. Quotas that are unused will be accessed by fishermen around our coasts, who will continue to support their vital rural and coastal communities in a law-abiding way.
My hon. Friend asked about the Select Committee report on who owns quotas. I agree with him. It is bizarre that we do not know. That is the product of the bizarre system that we have inherited, and we in the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs are seeking to correct that by finding out who does own quota and making sure that it is used properly.
I urge my hon. Friend to have faith in the MMO. It is doing a wide variety of different work and has some good people in it working hard. The compliance work is never easy, but it is important because, speaking generally, when illegal fishing takes place and illegal fish are landed, those fish have been stolen from the law-abiding fishermen whom we must protect. For that reason, we need a good and robust system. It is not just the EU that is doing this; other countries, such as Norway, run very strict sanction systems as well.