Examination of Witness

Part of Fisheries Bill – in a Public Bill Committee at 3:29 pm on 4 December 2018.

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Photo of David Duguid David Duguid Conservative, Banff and Buchan 3:29, 4 December 2018

Q Thank you, Mr Hanson. Mr Brown, there has been a lot of talk today about the ownership of quotas. As Mr Carmichael said earlier, if we were to design this again from scratch, we would not start from where we are. A lot of what you describe sounds like it might work if you were starting from scratch, but I cannot help but feel a bit squeamish about the idea of taking something away from someone who owns something—I am a Conservative; I cannot help myself. I do not see that as being fair. Not only does it in essence involve taking ownership of an asset away from someone, even over time, but how fair do you think it is that the fishermen who benefit, the smaller fishermen who would get a bigger share of the quota, in some previous generations might have benefited financially from selling that quota to the larger fishermen in the first place?