We have been assured by the minister that the TAC for all fish will remain unchanged and un-challenged (because that would have every environmental group on the planet heading for the courts to challenge the good ship UK on charges of refusing to acknowledge internationally agreed stock assessments and fishing without due care and attention) - so where will the fish come from?
After reading yesterday's response (below) to the minister's words of encouragement it is worth revisiting an article that appeared back in 1996 in the Independent under the heading, "Foreign vessels are legally taking a large chunk of the UK's fishing quota. But it is our own government's double-think and double-talk that is to blame rather than the minefield of EU rules"
But first, read on, from the Scotsman:
Scottish fishermen have welcomed an announcement that they will be allowed to keep more of their catch after Brexit
Scottish trawler.
Scotland’s fishermen will be able to keep more of the fish they catch in UK waters following Brexit, ministers have announced. More than half of the fish are currently landed by trawlers from the rest of the European Union (EU).
But Fisheries Minister George Eustice has confirmed there will be an overhaul of the quotas when Britain leaves the European Union.
He said regaining control of Britain’s 200-nautical-mile Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ), more than half of which is around Scotland, will mean a fairer deal. His comments have been welcomed by the Scottish Fishermen’s Federation (SFF), which said there needed to be a fairer distribution of resources.
Mr Eustice said: “It’s pretty clear that Brexit can be a good deal for British fishermen because we regain control. The equation is that they have one million tonnes of UK fish and we get about 150,000 tonnes of fish of various species.
“There are areas we would hope to get a better deal, particularly with cod and plaice. The truth is that things will change in a very fundamental way.”
Secondly, for the benefit of English readers, as reported by the Daily Telegraph:
British fisherman will catch hundreds of thousands of tonnes more fish after Brexit, minister says. British fishermen will be able to catch hundreds of thousands of tonnes more fish after Brexit because it will be able to overhaul "unfair" fishing quotas.
George Eustice said that Brexit will provide a "good deal" for fishermen because current quotas give a "disproportionately large" share of catches to fishermen from the EU.
He said that after Brexit the UK will strike new "reciprocal" arrangements with the European Union which will give fishermen a greater share of catches in British waters and abroad. He said that while a member of the European Union negotiations about fishing quotas had stalled because of the "institutionalised intertia" of Brussels.
English trawler.
He told The Daily Telegraph: "It's pretty clear that Brexit can be a good deal for British fishermen because we regain control. The equation is that they have 1 million tonnes of UK fish and we get about 150,000 tonnes of fish of various species.
"There are areas we would hope to get a better deal, particularly with cod and plaice. The truth is that things will change in a very fundamental way. In the Channel the French get twice as much plaice and three times as much Dover sole as we do, there is an imbalance."
Mr Eustice believes that fishermen in the Channel and the West Country could particularly benefit from reforms to fishing quotas. He highlighted the fact that Britain's share of plaice and sole in the English Channel is "incredibly low", with a similar situation for cod and haddock in the Celtic sea.
He said that here is no "balance" to Britain's fishing agreements with the EU, and that it "benefits more from access to the UK than the UK benefits from access to them".
Full story here:
What will be those 'reciprocal' arrangements?
