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Wednesday 28 November 2012

Spains`s subsidised fishing fleet a brutal waste of UK taxpayers` money

In a region with dwindling fish stocks and impoverished fishermen, the powerful Spanish fishing industry has received nearly €6 billion in EU subsidies amid claims of extensive fraud and a history of rule-breaking, a team of reporters from the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists has revealed.

"This report shows how UK taxpayers' money is being used by the EU – totally wasted," Nigel Farage MEP, UKIP leader and member of the EP Fisheries Committee said today.

"The Common Fisheries Policy has produced an economic and ecological disaster. We now see clearly that the Spanish fishing industry is over-sized, over-subsidised and its waters over-fished. The basic problem is that fishing in Europe is now under the control of the EU, and we can observe that anything it touches, be it Agricultural policy or fisheries policy, is an expensive exercise in economic waste.

"The heavily subsidised Spanish fishing fleet and fishless waters show a brutal waste of UK taxpayers' money.
 
"This situation can only stop when each country once again is responsible for its own waters and looks after the fish in its own water. To get rid of the Common Fisheries Policy we need to pull out of the EU and double quick too."
 
There's some interesting reading from the Centre for Public Integrity's web site available here: