Chamber and committees

You raise an important point. First, I highlight that any matter in relation to the level of penalty that is imposed is for the sheriff or the court to decide in each case. It is up to them to determine that, and we would not, and should not, have any locus in that regard.

We had a commitment previously to look at the overall enforcement penalty regime. We still intend to undertake that work, but we have a number of on-going pieces of priority work and other important matters that we need to consider in place of that. We are not intending to do that immediately, therefore, but it is still an important piece of work that we will be doing in future.

Absolutely. As I outlined earlier, we recognise that—as the committee will know from the evidence that you have heard and received in relation to the matter—stakeholders across the piece have an interest in looking at the spatial data in particular. That is why, as I said earlier, we have to be careful about how we use the data. With regard to the privacy elements, we have worked with the Information Commissioner to ensure that we are adhering to all our obligations in how we handle and process data. If we can aggregate and anonymise that data, we would then be in a position in which we could seek to make the information publicly available, which I think would help in relation to all the issues that you have outlined.

Yes. We do not want our Scottish vessels to be at a disadvantage compared with anyone else, so the draft regulations are really important in ensuring that they are not disadvantaged and that we have that level playing field.

The standard data transmission and retention duties are outlined in the legislation that we have introduced. I am happy to share the data protection impact assessment that we undertook. There will be a living document, which we will have to update, but I feel that we have set out the information, and more of the detail will be provided in the guidance and the privacy notices.

I would want to point out the benefit, as I see it, of having REM. As I have set out, it is about compliance and enforcement, as well as providing all the other information that we can look to glean from it. There are other benefits, too, as I have also set out. The information was volunteered from retailers themselves and from the MSC in response to our consultations. They have told us that directly.

The evidence and the information that we have gathered from that monitoring have been invaluable, and that has almost led us to where we are today. We actually started the roll-out of that monitoring in 2017, based on the calls of the fishing industry itself, which could see the benefits. The industry wanted to see REM mandated for the fleet because it saw the benefits of that as much as anyone else. It has been important that we have taken the learning from that, which has led to the development of the regulations that are in front of the committee today.

We consulted with the industry on the technical specifications and, of course, we shared a draft of those with the committee. Those specifications are, of course, very technical in nature and have been designed to support any future anticipated data requirements that we might have. Given that the technology continues to be developed, we might need to update those specifications in the future, depending on how things go.

We always intend to work with the industry as we update things because of its strong interest and the fact that, ultimately, it would need to implement the requirements. It is therefore in our best interests to ensure that we engage with the industry, and we did consult it on the technical specifications.

It is really helpful to have had our experience with the roll-out since 2017, because we can look at whether there are any particular issues or malfunctions and how often they happen. Like any system, REM needs to be maintained to ensure that it is operating effectively but, of course, malfunctions and technical faults do happen. However, from the roll-out so far, there have been few such incidents or cases. A particular issue was identified with the winch sensors because they are more exposed. There has been on-going work with engineers to find a solution to that, so we are implementing a resolution. In a minute, I will hand over to Ellen Huis, who can perhaps provide a bit more detail on that.

With regard to what we have set out in the regulations, we recognise that technical faults and malfunctions can happen, and we have tried to get the balance right and deal with that in a pragmatic way. We do not want to tie boats up, but we also have to make sure that the objectives of the SSI and what we are trying to achieve with it are met. We recognise the challenges, which is why we drafted the regulations in the way that we did.

I will hand over to Ellen Huis, who will provide a bit more information in relation to some of those particular issues.

We are not planning to issue any compensation. We have to make sure that we are taking a balanced and pragmatic approach, but we also have to make sure that we are not undermining the objectives of the legislation and what we need to achieve from REM. That is why we have set out in the regulations qualifications in relation to a first or second breakdown and other qualifications beyond that, as Ellen Huis has outlined. All of that is important because we need to ensure that we get the balance right. We cannot expect or allow fishing to continue if it undermines the objectives of the SSI.

What I was talking about, particularly in response to the previous question, was the data transition requirements. However, if there was a force majeure incident—if something catastrophic happened that was outwith the master’s control—we have exemption provisions to enable us to deal with that.