Chamber and committees

I certainly hope so. Part of the challenge that we face is the balancing of all those different interests. Like you say, inshore fisheries, for example, are hugely important to local economies and communities. Not long ago, I had a meeting with Dr Allan and some of his constituents at which we discussed the impact of those industries on employment and population levels in some of our most remote and rural locations. As I am the Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs and Islands, ensuring that we get a balance that enables people to live in our most remote and island communities is vital to me. I am not saying that I have all the solutions to the issue today, but I understand the complexities that we must balance, and we certainly take them into consideration when we are thinking about those issues.

The development of FMPs will be subject to consultation. We will look to develop them through discussion with our stakeholders. We use and engage with a number of fora, whether the FMACs, IFMACs or our regional inshore fisheries groups, so I imagine that they will be part of the process. We want to work with our stakeholders in the production of the FMPs. It is an integral part of the process.

It is not as if we develop such measures in isolation and without any engagement. We will look to keep our various stakeholders informed throughout the process. That is partly so that they can work with us. There is no point in developing policies or plans that, fundamentally, will not work or cannot be implemented by the people who are responsible for implementing them. Therefore, that engagement is critical.

We are ambitious and we want to deliver on the objectives that have been set out in the 2020 act and the policies that we have set out that will, ultimately, deliver those objectives. However, we also want to get it right. We want to take the right amount of time to have engagement and deliver the right policy.

I do not see a particular need at the moment to introduce a specific bill. Objectives were set out in the 2020 act and we are here today to discuss the framework in the JFS and the policy ambitions in that. I also set out last week how we intend to deliver on our fisheries management strategy, which was published towards the end of 2020. I do not know what other specific legal mechanisms we would need to bring forward to enable us to deliver on the policy objectives that we have set out, because I believe that we have the means to do that at the moment.

In last year’s debate in Parliament, I set out that we would be looking to introduce new economic link measurements as of the start of 2023. I will provide more detail on that in due course.

That is my ultimate aim, and I want to make sure that we get it right. However, as I said in my previous response, it is challenging because, although it seems that we have a huge area of sea surrounding us and a large coastal area, it is an increasingly busy space, with lots of different and competing interests that we must manage. We are working our way through some of that to see how we can balance all those interests. Specific stocks will only be in a specific area at a specific time and, as you mentioned, there is renewable energy and we have our marine protected area network and are looking to develop our highly protected marine areas. We are in the process of looking at some of that work at the moment.

We also have statutory processes to follow, whether we are establishing MPAs or looking at the planning and consenting process for offshore renewables, but we are very much trying to get to grips with those issues so that we are as fair and balanced as possible. There is some reference to that in the JFS, which talks about some of the other measures and the need to ensure that the ambitions that it sets out are aligned with other management measures around MPAs.

There is no doubt that this is a difficult and complex area, but I hope that it is one that we will be able to work our way through.

That issue was subject to a lot of discussion during consideration of the legislative consent memorandum for the Fisheries Bill. The setting of the total allowable catch for the UK is reserved to the secretary of state. That is the case for all stocks bar one, the responsibility for which is delegated. A key example relates to Clyde herring. The Scottish Government takes the lead on building the evidence in that regard and in setting the TAC. We also consult with our stakeholders, which advise on the TAC for the stock, and the information on the TAC is then given to the secretary of state for determination. As far as I am aware, there have been no issues in that regard, and we do not anticipate there being any.

We would also have to be clear about the benefits or otherwise of such an approach. Given that we have not considered it, that work has not been done.

The JFS would not be the place to set that out. As I said, that is about setting out the high-level ambitions—

Absolutely. That is why we want to meet stakeholders after the closure period to consider how we can move forward. However, in essence, we are open to considering mitigations with stakeholders.