European Issues
Item 2 on our agenda is European issues. We will consider the latest of my regular reports on European Union developments that are relevant to this committee.
The paper gives members an overview of recent activity in various issues relating to the environment, fisheries and aquaculture. Some of those issues are under development in the EU, while others are at the stage of being implemented in Scotland. I hope that the paper will help to inform people outwith the committee who are interested in the work that is coming up.
The paper lists the Executive's priorities for 2006 and highlights particular developments. Details are given on two issues on which we have agreed to hear evidence from the Minister for Environment and Rural Development on 6 December. Those issues are the rural development programme and the December fisheries council negotiations.
As colleagues know, issues relating to the rural development programme are developing all the time. I intend us to hear the up-to-date position from the minister on 6 December. Also, because that meeting takes place two weeks before the December fisheries council, we will be able to engage with the minister at a key point in the process.
Colleagues are invited to consider the paper and to highlight any issues on which they wish more information. We can request further information from the minister on any such issues before he comes to the committee on 6 December. There will obviously be other issues that we want to ask him about directly.
Some of the issues that are identified in my report are the European fisheries fund and simplification of the common fisheries policy; bio-energy and the biofuel strategy; the registration, evaluation and authorisation of chemicals regulation; the LIFE + environment funding programmes for 2007 to 2013; and the environmental liability directive.
There is a range of thematic strategies under the sixth action programme. They include strategies on soil protection, air pollution and the marine environment. We recently launched our own inquiry into the marine environment, and the European and External Relations Committee will hold a conference on 4 December to which we have all been invited.
A further thematic strategy is on the prevention and recycling of waste. That might give us greater regulatory certainty on waste legislation, an issue that the committee has raised on several occasions.
I do not know what issues colleagues would like us to follow up on, but I wanted to put those issues formally on our agenda.
It is good that it is on the record that those issues are on the agenda. We are getting to the time of year for negotiations with the Norwegians and for the end-of-year summit on fisheries.
The report says that nephrops, haddock and pelagic stocks are all in reasonable condition. Cod stocks are still thought to be outside safe biological limits; they show no appreciable sign of recovery. We have heard scare stories from the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea and from various think tanks about the possibility of a total ban on cod fishing. I want it on the record that there is extreme concern in fishing communities that cod continues to be regarded as some kind of iconic species.
Obviously, it is extremely important that we try to retain cod in our waters. However, the hard fact is that six years have gone by since the cod recovery plan was instituted but we are seeing little or no signs of the recovery of cod. For 15 years, there have been few or no cod off the east coast of Canada, despite all attempts there to preserve stock and have cod return. To many fishermen and an increasing body of scientists, it appears that the reason why cod are not there is much more related to climate than to overfishing.
I urge the minister, in his discussions towards the end of the year, to acknowledge that some people's lives are wholly dependent on the white-fish fishery. There has been a tremendous reduction in the size of the fleet and a number of jobs have gone in our communities around the coast. We cannot continue to threaten our fishermen—and a threat is what it amounts to—with a scare about one particular species. The minister has to acknowledge that.
The only other thing that I would like to add is that, when the minister goes to Brussels at the end of the year, he should be extremely careful to resist further attempts to increase the mesh size for the nephrops fishery. Nephrops have recovered. The nephrops fishery is progressing and has done well this year, but there is extreme fear that that will be undermined if we give in to a further increase in the mesh size for nets for the nephrop fishery. The matter is mentioned in the committee's briefing paper as one of the technical conservation measures in the action plan on the simplification of the common fisheries policy regulations.
I hope that the minister will take those points with him to the Brussels summit at the end of the year.
On a related theme, one of the biggest threats at this year's talks will be the extent to which the Commission wants to involve the prawn fishery to a greater extent in the cod recovery plan, on the assumption that there is a cod by-catch in the prawn fishery. We are told by the minister that that is not the case any more, but that is the number 1 danger at the talks this year.
The other main issue that I want to raise is the fact that the Commission may try to reinforce the cod recovery plan, albeit that it accepts that the plan is not working and wants to review it. That is an ironic situation that seems to arise often with the Commission.
One further issue concerns the rural development budget and the current debate over modulation. The minister recently told the committee that it is his policy that Scotland should have the right to determine its own level of modulation. That view is supported by the agricultural sector, and I think that it is the most sensible way forward. However, it is a complex subject and I would be grateful if the clerks could produce a separate briefing for us on the modulation debate, the impact that modulation would have and the various scenarios that could come out of it. That would help the committee to ask appropriate questions of the minister.
Mark Brough tells me that the clerks could produce a paper on that in time for our meeting on 6 December. That would be helpful.
I have an issue to raise on the internal EU fisheries negotiations. I know that the minister fully appreciates the significance of the recently constituted inshore fisheries group in the Western Isles. The group is ferociously conservation minded and is to be applauded for what it is setting out to do, especially in relation to the scallop fishery around the Western Isles. There was an unfortunate episode in the committee some years ago, when people who portrayed themselves as friends of the fishing communities willingly betrayed the interests of those communities. It is refreshing that the inshore fisheries group in the Western Isles is setting about protecting the scallop fishery.
If it is possible, I would like the clerks to ask the minister to furnish us with an update on where negotiations and discussions at the European level have reached with regard to the inshore fisheries group. The conservation measures that have been proposed and that are being implemented by Western Isles fishermen are to be whole-heartedly applauded, but they should be set in the proper Europe-wide context. I would appreciate it if a response from the minister on that could be brought to the committee, if that is possible.
Okay. That matter can be raised as well.
I have two issues to raise with the minister. Does anyone have any further issues on fisheries or rural development?
I would like to get some clarification about what is happening with the less favoured area support scheme and where the money is coming from.
We would like to have that formally reported to the committee and to be informed of where the money is coming from.
I have a brief comment on fishing that follows on from what Ted Brocklebank said. A lot of sacrifices have been made by the industry, and we do not want to throw away any gains that have been made. I recognise that the issues surrounding the cod recovery plan are complex, but I would hate to write off a species without being sure that we had given the recovery plan, which people have made sacrifices to implement, enough time to kick in.
I would also be interested to know whether the UK still draws down as much money as it has done historically from what used to be the financial instrument for fisheries guidance—I do not know what it is called now.
The European fisheries fund.
I would like to know whether Scotland has received its full entitlement under the European fisheries fund.
I am interested in paragraph 2 of the convener's briefing, under the heading of "Agriculture and Rural Development". It states:
"There is also a requirement to allocate 5% of total spending to local rural development projects administered by local partnerships (the LEADER approach)."
It is a while since I looked at a rural development consultation document, but it is not clear to me whether that is still going to be the case. I wonder how that is being taken forward, whether it is still under the umbrella of SEERAD and whether SEERAD is the right body to look at local projects that are community driven.
Those are my two points on fisheries and rural development. I have one or two other points on other things.
Okay. Thank you. I have two issues that I want to put on the agenda for our meeting with the minister on 6 December. I would like a bit more information about the EU's LIFE programme and its implications for the Natura 2000 sites. The briefing paper contains a comment about the potential for competition for those sites because there is less money available. I would like to know the implications of that. I presume that they are special areas of conservation and special areas of protection. I would like to know which sites will be impacted on and whether that will create any deterioration in the quality of those sites or their management.
My second point touches on a concern that I have. I note that the environmental liability directive must be implemented in Scots law by the end of April 2007 and that there will need to be consultation on it before the minister produces a statutory instrument. I am concerned about the timescale. The normal Executive consultation process contains very little time for turning round the consultation and submitting a statutory instrument. It is suggested that a consultation document will be issued before Christmas, but I would encourage the minister to have it issued as soon as possible, preferably by our committee meeting on 6 December. That would certainly aid public awareness about the directive. It is an important issue as well as a phenomenally complex one, so it would be good to get the consultation out to the public as soon as possible.
I wonder whether we can clarify with the minister, when he comes to the committee, the aspects of the environmental liability directive that relate to the issue of genetically modified crops. There is an issue to do with potential consultation on separation distances between GM crops and conventional or organic crops, which seems to be in abeyance at present. It would be helpful to know whether that issue will be included in the consultation.
We can get an update on that. That would be helpful.
I have one other issue to mention to colleagues. I have received a letter from Linda Fabiani, the convener of the European and External Relations Committee, which is about to consult key stakeholders on policy initiatives in the European Commission's legislative work programme for 2007. The letter notes that that work programme is likely to have a significant impact in Scotland and says that the European and External Relations Committee would like to open up the process to the Parliament's subject committees. I intend to write back informing Linda Fabiani that we receive regular updates from the minister on the EU's forthcoming programme—including the programme for 2007 under the German presidency—as well as regular updates on a quarterly basis at which we track all the key issues, as we have done today. I will write to Linda Fabiani with that information.
I think that our committee is slightly unusual in that, because European legislation on fisheries, the environment, agriculture and rural development is so important to our work, we track it on a regular basis. However, it would be worth while to make the European and External Relations Committee aware that we have certain key issues on our agenda, so that we do not overlap in our work or miss out any issues.
I thank colleagues for that discussion, which is now in the Official Report. I hope that interest groups in all the key stakeholder areas that we have discussed this morning will be aware of the issues that we are particularly keen to follow up with the minister when he comes before the committee on 6 December.