(1) No prohibition, restriction or obligation relating to sea fishing imposed by any enactment applies to—

(a) anything done or not done by or in relation to a foreign fishing boat at a time at which the fishing boat is in waters lying within the Special Area and is exclusively Faroe Islands-regulated, or

(b) anything done or not done in relation to sea fish that were caught by a foreign fishing boat in waters lying within the Special Area at a time at which the fishing boat was exclusively Faroe Islands-regulated.

(2) For the purposes of this section a foreign fishing boat is “exclusively Faroe Islands-regulated” if—

(a) there is in force a licence issued by or on behalf of the Government of the Faroe Islands authorising it to fish in waters lying (to any extent) within the Special Area, and

(b) the fishing boat is not on a list maintained and published by the Scottish Ministers for the purposes of this subsection.

(3) In this section—

(a) “enactment” has the same meaning as in the European Union (Withdrawal) Act 2018 and includes an enactment contained in or made under this Act;

(b) “the Special Area” means the Special Area, as defined in Article 4 of, and Schedule C to, the Faroe Islands Treaty;

(c) “the Faroe Islands Treaty” means the agreement between—

(i) the Government of the United Kingdom, and

(ii) the Government of the Kingdom of Denmark together with the Home Government of the Faroe Islands,

relating to the maritime delimitation in the area between the Faroe Islands and the United Kingdom, entered into on 18 May 1999.—(Victoria Prentis.)

This new clause exempts foreign fishing boats from UK regulation where they are fishing in the Special Area and have a Faroe Islands licence. It also gives the Scottish Ministers power to remove this exemption from particular foreign fishing boats by putting them on a published list. These changes are in order to comply with the treaty entered into with Denmark in 1999 on maritime delimitation in the area between the United Kingdom and the Faroe Islands.

Brought up, read the First and Second time, and added to the Bill.