With the greatest of respect, convener, you gave me only half of that sentence—that there is a

“presumption in favour of sustainable use”.

The second part is very important and I think that that is reflected in my answer to you, because you put it to me that there was a presumption for sustainable use and I said that it is a balance between the two things.

Indeed.

It does not really.

There are lessons to be learned from that, convener, but I would also point to what Kenny Coull said. He said that the static gear representatives could have been in those meetings but were not. I do not want to labour that point, because that was then and this is now. We now have a situation in which it is engaged, and I want those relationships to be nurtured and improved going forward, because if there is one lesson that we have learned—I am not referring just to Government, but to everyone who is involved—it is that we should not assume that the position in 2014 will be the position in 2020, because the science, the evidence and the data change.

On the cameras and sensors on boats that monitor fishing activities, I will just say that there is now a requirement for all scallop dredge vessels and pelagic fishing vessels that operate in Scottish waters to have sensors—whether they involve REM or whatever—to monitor all the activity that is associated with the catch. That applies not only to the Scottish fleet; it involves every vessel that is fishing in that area. The requirement will be rolled out to other fleet segments, so there will be even more data coming in from the fishing sector.

There is a 16-week consultation—I will ask John Mouat for the dates on that, because there are lots of consultations and I do not want to give the wrong dates. The spatial platform and everything associated with that will be available before the consultation, I believe.

I would not say that there is a presumption of anything in particular. The way that I would frame it would be to say that conservation of the marine protected areas is the main objective but, where possible, sustainable fishing can be allowed.

It is a useful example. Although you may be saying that we do not want to home in on static gear in particular, it is important that I address some of the points that I heard when you were taking evidence but also talk about how the static gear sector itself has been innovative in this space. First of all, it has already done an awful lot to reduce the bycatch of birds and marine animals associated with its practices, and that will be particularly important as we go forward in looking at the inshore MPAs. I absolutely accept that the sector takes its environmental responsibility very seriously.

The JNCC said that there could still be an impact from static gear operators’ practices, in particular on the corals, which are slow-growing, very vulnerable features. I think that the Aberdeen Fish Producers Organisation mentioned a study that its members had been involved in, I think with the University of St Andrews. The data that they provided backed up what the JNCC was saying, because that study identified an impact as well.

That said, Ms Grant, you are right that, if, in however many years—in a decade, for example—there is more robust evidence and data to suggest that we might allow certain types of gear to be used in areas and that it will not have an impact because the data and the evidence have come forward, of course we would adapt. That is very much the case. Similarly, if the industry came up with an innovation in the gear that it was putting forward or investing in such that there was no contact—I am not a fishing expert—and the pressures that had been identified in the evidence were no longer present, of course that would be a development.

It comes back to the adaptive approach. Again, you said that you did not want to home in on a particular sector but, when we were in the EU, the static gear sector was very involved in the discussions about all of this. Evidence and data change and that is part of the adaptive process. There are a couple of MPAs in which the JNCC advised that there might be long-term potential damage to very vulnerable types of benthic structures, particularly in coral.

Yes. Over the past few years, in particular, we have tried to address the gaps in some of the data coming forward. I mentioned the REM equipment that is now in inshore vessels, but we also have the vessel monitoring systems in the marine directorate. They do not just provide data; they monitor compliance as well. We also have fisheries protection vessels and aircraft, and monitoring associated with that.

This is probably a good chance for me to bring in John Mouat with the detail of some of the work that has been done over the past few years, because we recognise that, with the marine environment, there are data and evidence gaps that need to be filled, and Governments have an important role in making sure that those data gaps are filled.

“As long as” is very important.