Subordinate Legislation Committee, 02 Nov 1999

Meeting date: Tuesday, November 2, 1999

Official Report 83KB pdf

---

Lobsters and Crawfish (Prohibition of Fishing and Landing) (Scotland) Order 1999 (SSI 1999/88)

Good morning. The first item on the agenda is Executive responses. Do members have any points that they wish to raise with regard to the order?

Article 3 of the order prohibits

"fishing for

(a) a mutilated lobster
(b) a mutilated crawfish, or
(c) any lobster or crawfish bearing a V notch."

We asked the Executive to explain how an offence is committed under this provision, because there is a separate provision that makes it a criminal offence to land fish that fall into those categories. In its response, the Executive argued that fishermen who find that they have those types of fish in their catch can throw them back, and thereby avoid prosecution. The provision is redundant and, as it creates a criminal offence, it should not be present in any statutory instrument.

Bristow, do you have a different view on that matter?

Personally, I think that the likelihood of prosecutions is probably extremely slim and that fishermen who return fish that had been caught accidentally would not be prosecuted. However, I accept that the point made by Fergus is accurate, as a strictly technical interpretation. There is something not very comfortable about bringing again to the attention of the Executive that this particular part of the order is unnecessary and that it would probably be better if it were deleted.

Should we draw to the Executive's attention that we think that that part is superfluous? I do not think that the lead committee will go to the wall over this issue, but that is a matter for them.

It has just occurred to me that, presumably, if one were fishing for salmon, the act of fishing would be illegal, whether or not one threw the fish back. The intention is to discourage people from going out to look for these fish. There is a point at which the act of fishing for prohibited species is an offence, as it should be. I think that our position is probably all right.

In this case, the act of fishing for lobsters is not an offence, as the species is not prohibited. Indeed, the order says that the fishing industry supports these particular regulations. It would be perfectly appropriate to follow the line that Fergus suggested.

My only other comment is that I noticed that the regulation only applies to Scottish or British fishermen and not to fishermen from other parts of the European Union. I do not know what the fishing industry thinks of that, but that is something for the lead committee rather than for this committee.

Perhaps we can leave that to the clerks and couch the letter in terms of our thoughts that article 3 is superfluous, although we appreciate the difficulties where there is a general intention to try to prevent certain circumstances arising. [Interruption.] It has been pointed out to me that we do not have time to go back to the Executive. We will have to put our comments in our report, which might flag up the issue to the Executive. We can draw to the attention of the Rural Affairs Committee the question of how it may wish to deal with such matters, should there be time available on its agenda.