Hansard

He has got that wrong, actually—[Laughter.]—wrong species. Some colleagues spent some time in their opening remarks talking about how many times they have spoken in this annual debate over the years. I tend to forget how many times I have spoken in such debates.

I thought that the best introduction was from Maureen Watt, who cited the Finnie-Brankin Christmas present concordat, which is going back some years. I do not know whether the cabinet secretary is going to reveal his Christmas present strategy this year, but I rather reckon that he will be the one buying the presents for Mairi Gougeon next week in Brussels, not least because he will be finished rather earlier than in that particular year when I remember the negotiations finishing on Christmas eve and everyone being worried about getting the last plane out of Brussels, which is certainly a moral of the story.

The important aspects to this debate have been about the day-to-day impact of the December council decisions. The less important parts of the debate have involved the ritualistic running through of yet another discussion about Brexit.

I want to deal briefly with the amendments. I understand the argument that Mark Ruskell makes for the Green amendment, but I believe, like others, that that amendment would be appropriate were it to mention all the other vessels that fish in the coastal waters around Scotland and the UK. That would be the appropriate way to word the amendment. In fairness to Mark Ruskell, his speech seemed to concentrate on scallop dredging and measures on the west coast of Scotland, more than on deep sea fishing. Nevertheless, for that amendment to be supported, it needed to mention all vessels, rather than just the Scottish fleet.

I accept up to a point Rhoda Grant’s arguments in support of the Labour amendment about ownership models and what Governments should and should not do. I am not a great believer in the idea that the Government must do everything on fishing policy or indeed fishing ownership. The other aspect that I suggest needs some further thought is that producer organisations play a heavy role—certainly in my part of the world—in exactly what she has described: the allocation of quotas and ensuring that moneys are reinvested. In Shetland, the quota leasing policy allows money to be reinvested in new tonnage and in new entrants. I entirely accept her point about new entrants—she is absolutely right about that—but what we are after in that sense is ensuring the right model and that may differ according to the different fishing arrangements in different parts of Scotland. We have a shared ownership model in Shetland; I appreciate that that is entirely different from the model in the north-east, where there a different, more vertically integrated structure to the ownership of the industry in the catching sector. Nevertheless, I think that that needs some further thought to become a practical policy.

I cannot support the Conservative amendment. It is just about Brexit, rather than the fisheries council, which is what this debate should be about. I entirely accept that there is a wider debate happening right now; we cannot get away from it. My concern about what we thought that the UK Government had negotiated and what we thought was going to be put to a vote at 7pm tonight, which is obviously not happening now, is that fishing is not in the withdrawal agreement. There is no legally binding text to do with fishing. When I asked David Lidington—who is, to all intents and purposes, the Deputy Prime Minister—at a committee meeting in Parliament a week or so ago why fishing had not been included in the withdrawal agreement and therefore was in the political declaration, he said that that was down to the negotiations. Indeed, it is a matter that is down to the negotiations—that is the point. The UK Government did not get what it said it was going to get. We can all use the language of this, that and the next thing about this but when it comes down to it, the fishermen at home ask me why fishing is not in there. If it was so important to the UK Government, why did it not successfully get fishing in the agreement?

That is not a question for the Scottish Conservatives to answer—it is a question for the UK Government. However, at the very least, the Scottish Tories should not defend an outcome that did not deliver something that the fishing industry asked for. For that reason, I will not support Mr Chapman’s amendment, although I agree with his point on blue whiting. The cabinet secretary will know better than I, but my understanding is that there is a fairly complex business model for the blue whiting quota and how it is traded, which involves Dutch business expertise, and to all intents and purposes, we end up losing blue whiting quota. The cabinet secretary acknowledged that in his opening remarks. A number of parts of the Scottish catching fleet then have to lease back in saith, which then comes back in to Scotland through a circuitous route. I know that the cabinet secretary understands that argument and the more that he can do to assist the Scottish fleet—both pelagic and white-fish—the better. Peter Chapman also alluded to that point and it is certainly important.

Rhoda Grant made an important point, which Lewis Macdonald went on to develop, about what is happening next year and the year after. After March 2019, depending on what happens, no Scottish minister, whether that is Mr Ewing or someone else, and no UK minister will be involved in the negotiations. The industry has been given assurances that officials will keep in touch with their opposite numbers and with the European Commission, but the most damning assessment of the future is that there will be no minister at the council next year, in the way that Mr Ewing will be there this year, to represent Scottish fishing interests. If that is a great triumph for the UK Government and for UK negotiation, do not tell me what a disaster is: it will be without precedent. Whatever one’s opinion of the common fisheries policy, it is better to have ministers at the council, representing our industries, than not to have ministers there. Yet, that is the practical impact of what is currently being negotiated and, for the love of me, I cannot imagine that anyone would want to defend that approach.

My final point for the cabinet secretary is that very serious preparations for a no-deal must be made, not least because of Alasdair Allan’s point about the prawn catches that are made by those in his constituency and in the west coast, and the logistics chain that moves the catch across the Channel. Around two thirds of the catch from this country ends up in Europe and if we have no deal, which there is now a risk of, there will be delays in the catch crossing the Channel—Gordon MacDonald is quite right about that—and the Government of the day will have to find ways to assist the industry with that.

Lewis Macdonald’s phrase “the fog of uncertainty” is apt. Although we have as much certainty as we ever have when the cabinet secretary goes to the annual negotiations, and although we know what he seeks to achieve—most of us broadly agree with his negotiating strategy and wish him well—there is none the less a fair degree of uncertainty, a fog of uncertainty, about next year. For the industry, above all—both the catching and the processing industry—that must be the biggest cause of concern.