In a typically flamboyant gimmick in a campaign speech, Boris Johnson waved a smoked kipper and an icepack, claiming that the EU imposed bureaucratic regulations that required such packaging, and that Brexit would enable Britain to do away with such nonsense.
It was a lie. Packaging rules are solely a matter for national governments, and the Conservatives, which he had supported consistently, had done nothing over nine years in government to change them. It is far from the only lie that has been told about fishery policy by those supporting Brexit.
It is well known that fishing communities voted overwhelmingly for Brexit, and that the Conservatives won seats in fishing areas of Scotland in 2017 because they were seen as the party of Brexit. The Conservatives are pitching the same line again. In response to a planted question in the House of Commons just before the General Election was called, asking for a ‘categorical assurance’ that the UK ‘will not use our fish stocks as a bargaining chip in future negotiations’, Boris Johnson asserted, ‘I can confirm that we will take back 100% control of the spectacular marine wealth of this country.’
In the Conservative Party manifesto for the General Election it is repeated:
Upon leaving the EU, we will leave the Common Fisheries Policy becoming an independent coastal state and taking back control of our waters;
You cannot take back control of something you have always controlled.
Leaders of the fishery industry, who mainly represent the big trawlers not the small-scale fisheries, have long condemned the EU’s Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) for the industry’s woes, which include the collapse of cod and haddock stocks and depletion of many other species. Fishing and fish are emotive subjects in Britain, and even though those involved in fisheries comprise a tiny share of the labour force, they figure high in people’s imagination. So, the facts should matter.
The first fact is that the crisis has little to do with the CFP. Catches in UK waters have declined by over 94% in the past 130 years, and the decline long predated Britain joining the CFP. The CFP has at least slowed down the depletion of stocks, through its ‘total allowable catch’ rule. The UK’s fishing industry as a whole has been making big profits (a gross profit of over 30% in some years). The trouble is that only a few large-scale fishers have been making most of that, for reasons that will become clear later in this piece.
Second, Britain has done well out of the CFP’s system. Of the six million tonnes of fish landed by EU countries, Britain is the second largest, with 700,000 tonnes from UK waters, with a further 52,000 tonnes from other EU waters. Brexiteers complain that the UK has received too little of the TAC. But the industry suffers from overfishing. If Brexit occurs, no sensible government would increase the TAC. If they did, they would be indicating they are in the thrall of the large-scale fisheries that gain from overfishing, through higher prices and consolidation of control, as marginal fisheries are driven into bankruptcy or decommissioning of boats.
So, the question voters should ask candidates is:
Would they impose more restrictions on EU fishing in UK waters, bearing in mind that this would lead to retaliation and the likelihood of rising tariffs that would hit the UK shellfish sector particularly hard?
Third, Britain imports from the EU almost as much fish as it exports to it, and relies on the EU market. Many observers present an image of British fisheries as based on cod and haddock. This is not the case; most of these iconic fish consumed in the UK are imported, and are classified as having unsustainable stocks in the North Sea. Meanwhile, the mainstay of UK’s fisheries is shellfish, which comprise the main source of exports, most going to the EU.
Fourth, Britain receives considerable subsidies from the CFP, and provides its fisheries with more than most other EU countries; it could have handed out even more, although that would be unwise. The point is that it is Westminster that determines the amount and type of subsidies. Blaming the CFP is invalid.
The EU’s CFP has allocated the UK £243 million in fishing subsidies between 2014 and 2020. One would like to know from the parties whether that money will be replaced after Brexit. This economist, for one, predicts the fishing communities will not receive anything like that.
So, the questions voters should ask the politicians are as follows:
Would they implement a ‘total allowable catch’ policy?
If so, would it be larger or smaller than the existing TAC under EU rules, and would they insist on having a social manager (government appointee) to enforce the rules, someone independent of fishery owners?[i]
So far, only the Green Party has a clear stance on fishing subsidies. As in the 2017 General Election, they are resolutely opposed to them. Evidence from around the world indicates that is roughly correct, if the collapse of fish stocks is to be avoided. The main exceptions are ‘research’ and ‘General Service and Management’ subsidies, which have beneficial effects if proper management rules are applied with adequate resources.
The Labour Party manifesto includes a mildly promising commitment:
We will set maximum sustainable yields for all shared fish stocks, redistribute fish quotas along social and environmental criteria and, if people vote to leave the EU, require the majority of fish caught under a UK quota to be landed in UK ports.
The Conservative Party manifesto includes a similar statement on maximum sustainable yields:
There will be a legal commitment to fish sustainably and a legal requirement for a plan to achieve maximum sustainable yield for each stock.
It also states:
We will maintain funding for fisheries across the UK’s nations throughout the Parliament and support the regeneration of our coastal communities;
The Conservatives say nothing about the level of funding, and fail to mention the need to cover for the lost income from the CFP subsidies. If they were intending to continue the £243 million gained through the CFP, that should have been in their Manifesto’s Costing document. But there is no mention of anything. There is no need for a statement in the Labour, Green or Liberal Democrat manifestos, since none of them plan on a certain Brexit. But any party promising Brexit should be required to say whether they would replace CFP subsidies fully or partially.
Then we come to the policy on which the most lies have been perpetrated. The CFP operates what is called a fixed quota system. Guided by scientific advice, ministers in charge of fishery policy of member states meet each year to decide on the ‘total allowable catch’ of major fish species, and then agree on quotas for each member state on a formula based on past practices and catches of those species.
One lie told by Brexiteers is that the CFP allocates the quotas. But the distribution is left entirely to national governments. Here is where the scandal begins. Under the Conservatives, over two-thirds of quotas have been given to just 25 companies, dubbed the ‘codfathers’ by Greenpeace, while under 2% has gone to small-scale fishers, even though they make up 79% of the fishing fleet. Worse, over a quarter (29%) have been quietly handed to just five families on the Sunday Times Rich List.
Even worse, 13 of the 25 companies that were given most of the quotas had directors or vessel partners convicted in an over-fishing scam in 2011-12 in Scotland. This is known as the ‘black fish’ scam. The companies clandestinely landed 170,000 tonnes of undeclared herring and mackerel, worth £63 million. Leaders in the fishing industry who claim that it can self-regulate should be reminded of that scam. Sadly, it did not stop the perpetrators continuing to receive the Government’s very large quotas.
The Conservatives and Liberal Democrats after 2010 and the Conservatives since 2015, have compounded the disastrous policy by continuing to allow quotas to be tradeable, as commodities, in spite of predictable and long-established consequences. The big companies have been buying quotas from smaller firms, and foreign firms have bought ‘British’ quotas by registering their boats in the UK, a trend dubbed ‘quota hoppng’. If you believe in the supremacy of private property rights and turn quotas into private property, do not be surprised at this outcome. There has been increasing monopolisation, associated with more intensive rentier capitalism in the industry, and self-induced colonisation.
The latter has been dramatic. One Dutch multinational, with a British subsidiary North Atlantic Fishing Company, owning a 114-metre long flagship fishing trawler, now possesses about a quarter of all the UK quota. With other ‘quota hoppers’ coming from Spain, Iceland and The Netherlands, foreign-owned boats now hold about half the UK’s quotas.
The quota system has produced several ironies. In an orchestrated event that may have tipped the balance in favour of Brexit, in 2016 a flotilla of fishing boats went up the Thames. Nigel Farage was on the flagship, i.e., a foreign owned boat flying the UK flag. It belonged to one of the ten largest quota holders. The motto of the campaign was ‘Bring back control.’ One could be confident in thinking that the flagship would be a primary beneficiary.
Second, the Government’s White Paper on fishery policies post-Brexit, published in 2019, stated that there would be no change in the quota distribution after Brexit. That surely reflects the power structure in the fishing industry and the ideology of private property rights. Put bluntly, if the Conservatives are elected they have committed to channelling more rights and money to the codfathers and quota-hoppers, and practically nothing to small-scale fisheries, the latter should not complain if they vote Conservative and that is what happens. In the circumstances, every voter concerned with fisheries should ask all candidates the following:
Do you agree with the Conservatives’ White Paper statement, ‘We do not intend to change the method for allocating existing quota.’
In a related policy, the government has claimed it wishes to support ‘discard-free fisheries’. This is significant because of the quota system. It has been common for fishers worried about exceeding their quotas to discard fish caught that are less valuable, notably juveniles and species not valued much in the UK. This has been a cause of declining fish stocks.
If there is a market for species not valued by UK consumers but valued in the EU, the tendency to discard good edible fish is held in check. But if the UK is cut off from the EU market, discarding will grow. The government and industry representatives may huff and puff and say that will be controlled. The reality is that, whereas with the CFP there is an EU-level inspection system, the UK has only 12 vessels for monitoring fishing practices for all UK waters up to 200 nautical miles from its coasts. Research has shown that without strong regulation through diligent monitoring, a quota system, as operating in the UK, will lead to rapid fish stock depletion.
So, voters in fishing communities should ask candidates what policy would they favour to minimise discard practice and whether that would be as good as exists in the EU today.
Confusion in the Conservative leadership has been intensified by the statement of Minister in charge of fishery policy, Michael Gove, that the UK would also leave the London Fisheries Convention of 1964, which predates the EU, and which allows vessels from the UK, France, Belgium, Germany, Ireland and the Netherlands to fish within six and twelve miles of each other’s coastline. He then admitted that British fisheries did not have the capacity to take over and so EU nations would continue to have access to UK waters. To talk grandiosely about ‘regaining sovereignty’ in such circumstances is ludicrous.
Voters in fishing communities should demand that Conservative candidates explain how claims of 100% sovereignty can be credible in view of those statements by their responsible minister.
There is one devastating point. International research has shown that the full privatisation of fisheries, as wanted by the Conservatives and the Brexit Party, can drive fish stocks down to extinction. Welcome to full sovereignty.
Finally, if Brexit occurs, the part of the UK that would benefit most in terms of fisheries is Scotland, but only if it had jurisdiction over its fisheries. Thus, post-Brexit fishery policy may push Scotland to want to leave the UK, something many Brexiteers may not have factored into account.
Photo credit: Flickr/Chris Bentley.
[i] International research has shown that private self-regulation leads to fishing to a level below recovery, even if there are barriers to entry by ‘foreigners’.