Fisheries

Part of the debate – in the House of Commons at 5:02 pm on 7 December 2005.

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Photo of Douglas Carswell Douglas Carswell Conservative, Harwich 5:02, 7 December 2005

I agree. I am here not to score points or to make cheap partisan political points, but to talk about what we can do to ensure that we have a proper fishing policy in the interests of the people who live on this island.

As was said very eloquently earlier, fish do not stop at arbitrary boundaries. Fish do not recognise arbitrary divisions on a map. That is certainly true, but by Europeanising member states' fishing policies and by pushing power away from member states and putting it into the hands of unelected, unaccountable quangos in Brussels, the democratic dynamic and the democratic scrutiny of policy have been removed. That is the fundamental reason why the common fisheries policy has failed. We can talk about the detail, the quotas and the changes that can be made; we can tinker and try to improve things, but without that democratic scrutiny, the CFP will always get it wrong.

It is said that that which no one owns, no one will care for, and the member states have lost ownership of their fisheries policy, so the people who are left caring for it are not accountable to the people whose livelihoods depend on the sea—fishermen. We need to push power away from the unelected quangos in Brussels and move it down not simply to the member state but beyond. Again, there is agreement about that. It is no coincidence that countries with successful, thriving fishing industries—Iceland and Norway—have retained their capacity to make their policy independently. They have much to teach us.

Policy should not be simply shifted down to member states as an end in itself, but as a means to the greater end of localising control. In Essex or Scotland, people could have local control over fishing policy in their areas, but the first step, the prerequisite, is to push control down to the nation state.