SPANISH fishermen could end up in control of the North Sea under new rules being thrashed out in Brussels.
This is the warning from Scots Euro MP Struan Stevenson ahead of the imminent reform of the Common Fisheries Policy.
Mr Stevenson, senior vice president of the European Parliament Fisheries Committee, fears the reform will drive through amendments that will transfer traditional Scottish fishing rights to foreign ownership.
He believes that 139 proposed amendments to the CFP Green Paper to be voted through in a special plenary session in Brussels tomorrow (February 24) will open the door to a takeover by wealthy foreign fishing concerns.
One amendment specifically states that “access to fish stocks should no longer be based solely on the criterion of historical catches.”
Mr Stevenson said: “I believe that this is a potentially explosive alteration to the current rules which allocates fishing rights based on historical track records, providing evidence that generations of Scottish fishermen have fished in a particular area.
“If this rule is changed, Spanish fishermen could argue that they have equal access rights to our traditional fishing grounds in the North Sea and West of Scotland.”
Another amendment calls on the European Commission to look at the adoption of new fisheries management models including “the use of transferable fishing rights.”
Mr Stevenson said: “If a system of individual transferable quotas (ITQ’s) is introduced, we can expect the same situation to occur that we witnessed in Iceland where a handful of wealthy fishing companies quickly seized control of all of the available whitefish quotas, forcing many small fishing companies out of business.
“Once again I fear that the combination of new access rules, together with ITQ’s, will simply enable wealthy Spanish fishing concerns to buy up most of our Scottish whitefish quotas, leaving the Spanish fleet in control of the North Sea.
“The impact on our fishermen would be disastrous. But it is not only the fishermen who would lose out. Our ports and harbours would suffer as a consequence, particularly if the Spanish vessels decided to land their catch back in Galicia rather than in Peterhead or Fraserburgh, which is highly likely.
“While I am all for reforming the CFP, which has been a catastrophe for our fishing sector since its inception, I am determined to ensure that we don’t open the door to a bargain basement sale of Scotland’s fishing heritage.
“I will be putting down a series of amendments which seek to protect our industry and I will be looking to get the majority of MEPs to support me in the votes.”
