Sea Fisheries (Shellfish) Amendment (Scotland) Bill
We now come to motion S1M-1222, in the name of Tavish Scott, which seeks agreement that the Sea Fisheries (Shellfish) Amendment (Scotland) Bill be passed.
Members who wish to speak should press their request-to-speak buttons. Before I call Tavish Scott, I advise members that they are not required to speak up to the time limit imposed earlier.
I thank you for that pointed remark, Presiding Officer.
Today sees the end of a long saga of attempts to make a minor amendment to an act and to remove an unnecessary source of friction between shellfish growers and creel fishermen.
As might be expected, I would like to place on record my thanks to many people. First and foremost, I thank Doug McLeod of the Association of Scottish Shellfish Growers, who worked long and hard to achieve what I hope we will achieve today.
Doug McLeod first took the matter to Westminster, where, with the help of my colleague Jim Wallace in the House of Commons and Lord MacKay of Ardbrecknish in the House of Lords, a bill very similar to the Sea Fisheries (Shellfish) Amendment (Scotland) Bill was introduced. Were it not for the actions of a maverick MP, that bill would have been passed successfully. Alas, that single MP blocked the bill, which fell. I am far too polite to remember of which party he was a member.
Doug McLeod saw the establishment of the Scottish Parliament as a chance to try again. He was seeking help before the Queen had made her trip north to open the Parliament. I hope that the chamber will be happy to offer him that help today.
Things started to move, and the list of people whom I must thank includes the MSPs from all parties who supported the bill's proposals. The bill is an excellent example of MSPs working together on a small but important measure for an important Scottish industry.
I also wish to place on record my thanks to the many clerks who provided guidance on the wording of the bill and on procedural matters. I know that my parliamentary assistant is particularly grateful for the timely and tactful reminder from the clerks of the need to submit a motion for today's debate.
The lead committee for the bill was the Rural Affairs Committee and I am grateful to Alex Johnstone and his colleagues for the work that they did at stages 1 and 2, to consider the bill and to speed it on its way, particularly in the context of the difficult times that they faced when assessing more controversial bills.
I also thank the Deputy Minister for Rural Affairs and the Executive for their constructive support in progressing the bill, and the many organisations that responded to the Rural Affairs Committee's consultation with supportive and constructive comments.
There is not much to be said about so short a bill, so I will indeed be brief. The bill has one simple aim: to remove an unnecessary source of conflict between shellfish farmers and creel fishermen. The farming of quality shellfish already provides employment in coastal areas of the Highlands and Islands and has the potential to create further jobs. Such farming is environmentally friendly and, as demand outstrips supply from the wild, it has an important role to play.
It is unfortunate that, under the act that I seek to amend, a shellfish farmer who seeks a several order to give him control over his stock on an area of the sea bed can gain that control only at the expense of creel fishermen. The fishermen lose traditional fishing grounds, despite the fact that their operations do not harm the farmer's shellfish and may even help the farmer by removing predators. My short bill provides the means by which the source of conflict is removed, and should allow farmers and fishermen to live in harmony.
My only regret is that the Liberal Democrat group has yet to discuss the bill, so I have no idea which way it will vote. However, I hope that the rest of the Parliament will recognise that the bill makes a difference on an issue that is important to a small group of people and to an important Scottish industry. I ask members to give the bill their full support.
I move,
That the Parliament agrees that the Sea Fisheries (Shellfish) Amendment (Scotland) Bill be passed.
Before I call John Home Robertson, I ask members to keep down the general background noise, as other members are still contributing to the debate.
I congratulate Tavish Scott on achieving not only the passage of the Sea Fisheries (Shellfish) Amendment (Scotland) Bill, but on achieving what is likely to be the first enactment by the Scottish Parliament of a member's bill. [Applause.]
The bill is a little bit of Scottish history in the making. It is just 93 words long, despite Jamie McGrigor's best efforts to add another four and get it a bit nearer to the 100-word threshold. Perhaps it should be carved on a tablet of stone and erected at an appropriate point on the island of Bressay. Seriously, I congratulate Tavish on introducing the amendment bill, which, as he said, has been repeatedly thwarted in Westminster. Its progress shows what we can do here in the Scottish Parliament. It is an excellent example of how the new Scottish Parliament can address small issues as well as big ones and tackle problems affecting different groups of people in different parts of Scotland.
Will Mr Home Robertson give way?
As I was speaking of small parties, yes.
Speaking of big issues, I hope that the minister agrees that there is not much point in making these quite important but quite small technical changes to assist shellfish farmers and creel fishermen if the marine environment is seriously threatened. Will he assure us that he will tak tent of the World Wide Fund for Nature report that states quite clearly that our marine environment is seriously threatened at present? Does the Executive intend to prepare an action plan for Scotland's marine environment?
That question goes a long way wide of the bill that we are debating this afternoon. However, Robin Harper is quite right to say that we should take seriously the evidence of things going wrong in our marine environment and the need to tackle those problems. That is something that I work on with Sarah Boyack and other colleagues in the Executive; it is an important matter.
Returning to the bill, the Executive is working closely with all parts of the fishing industry, not least the Scottish inshore fisheries advisory group, to develop sustainable fishing opportunities. We are happy to give our whole-hearted support to the constructive amendment bill.
At the stage 1 debate in Glasgow on 18 May, we discussed the very real technical problem that has thwarted 22 out of 30 applications to promote shellfish farming projects under the provisions of the Sea Fisheries (Shellfish) Act 1967. Several orders under that act have the effect of severing areas designated for scallop or oyster farmers from the general right of fishermen to fish in the sea. The problem is that those orders do not distinguish between mobile gear, such as trawls, which would damage shellfish stocks, and creels, which would not damage them. Scallops, oysters and the rest are truly remarkable creatures, but they are unlikely to be harmed by the presence of creels that are set for crabs, lobsters or prawns. I have yet to see a mature scallop that could find its way into a prawn creel.
Under the current legislation, several order restrictions must apply to all fishing gear, including creels, so it is understandable that creel fishermen frequently object to the making of several orders that would shut them out of traditional fishing grounds for no constructive reason. That is one of the reasons why only eight applications have succeeded. That difficulty obviously obstructs the development of a valuable industry that could create and sustain jobs in some very remote coastal and island areas.
This simple bill is the solution to that problem. It will make it possible to exclude specified non-damaging fishing gear—creels—from the ban on fishing in waters covered by several orders. We should be able to develop shellfish farming without imposing unnecessary constraints on other fishermen. A number of detailed points have been considered by the Rural Affairs Committee and elsewhere, and I am glad that we have been able to achieve mutual agreement on all but the narrow drafting point that Jamie McGrigor raised earlier in our proceedings.
I conclude by congratulating Tavish Scott and thanking him for the way in which he has worked to bring the amendment legislation forward. I thank all members of the Rural Affairs Committee for their handling of stages 1 and 2 of the bill, and I thank representatives of the fishing industry—the Scottish Fishermen's Federation and the Association of Scottish Shellfish Growers—for their participation. Everybody has worked together and we welcome that constructive approach to the initiative. The Executive strongly supports the bill.
Before calling Richard Lochhead, I remind members that I asked earlier for background noise to be decreased, rather than increased.
I will keep my comments brief, because I sense that members are looking forward to decision time.
I congratulate Tavish Scott, who will go down in history as the promoter of the first member's bill to go on the statute book in the first Scottish Parliament for 300 years. Members' bills are an essential part of the democratic process in our new Parliament. The bill may not be controversial, but it is very worth while and has travelled through the system smoothly. Let us hope that the Parliament treats all members' bills in an even and fair manner.
Thankfully, in this Parliament there are few tricks or underhand tactics that can be used to stop members' bills. That is more than can be said for that clapped-out, draconian place in London. It is pathetic that an uncontroversial bill such as this, which can help remote communities in northern Scotland, was stopped in Westminster on more than one occasion by an MP standing up and shouting "Object." If that happened here, our Presiding Officer would step in and tell the member to sit down and shut up.
The bill is also an illustration of how good the Parliament has been for fishing, although the Government's record has been rather more disappointing. At Westminster there has been no time to discuss fishing priorities in Scotland or members' bills.
I do not want to go over the detail of the bill, because Tavish Scott has done that adequately. I welcome the fact that there was widespread support for the uncontroversial bill. Indeed, the Rural Affairs Committee spent less than 20 minutes discussing the bill at stage 2. Any measure that reduces conflict between our fishing organisations must be welcomed. I ask Parliament to support the bill.
Despite the failure of the amendment, I thoroughly support the bill and congratulate Tavish Scott on introducing it. I hope that it will put an end to the disputes between the shellfish growers industry and the creel fishing industry.
One member who was not directly involved in the passage of the bill has indicated that she wishes to speak. I will call Rhoda Grant, if she promises to keep her speech to one minute.
I would argue that I was involved in the passage of the bill. I signed it and sat on the Rural Affairs Committee which considered it. However, I will keep my comments short, because it is very difficult to find something new to say about such an excellent bill.
The bill may set a few records. First, it is likely to be the first member's bill to be passed by the Parliament. Secondly, for a long time it will probably hold the record of being the shortest bill considered by the Parliament. Thirdly, the smallest amount of parliamentary time will have been spent on it. It will be very difficult to beat those records.
The bill shows that the Parliament can work. Following two failed attempts to take the bill through Westminster, the Scottish Parliament—after just over a year of existence—will approve it. That shows that back benchers can change the law, which is important and should be welcomed by all members.
I thank the member and apologise for getting her involvement wrong. I call Tavish Scott to wind up the debate.
I have nothing to add.