HL Deb 19 April 1904 vol 133 cc502-15

House in Committee (according to Order).

Clause 1—

LORD TWEEDMOUTH

, in rising to move the Amendment standing in his name, said that one of the commendable objects of this Bill was to do something to prolong the life of a large proportion of the vast number of small flat fish which were year by year destroyed in the North Sea. With that object he was entirely in sympathy, and he could assure their Lordships that if they accepted the Amendment standing in his name it would make the provisions of the Bill clearer and more acceptable to the fishermen of the country, and it would also make the Bill itself more efficient in practice. In all questions of sea fisheries there were certain considerations which should be clearly kept in mind. The first was the fact that. come what might, they could not help catching small fish, especially in trawling. When the trawl was down everything. big and small, went into it, and very little escaped out. The small fish were included in the general catch, and were brought up and taken on board the trawler. It was said that something could be done by means of enlarging the size of the mesh, but that could not be: effective to any very great extent, I because directly they enlarged the mesh to such a size as to allow of an appreciable escape of small flat fish, they also allowed round fish to escape, and the catching power of the net was thereby largely reduced. When a trawl which had? been down for a considerable time dragging along the bottom of the sea was brought up and the fish released, it was generally found that a large proportion of the smaller fish were dead, and those that were not dead got trampled upon whilst the bigger and more marketable fish were being selected on deck. When they necessarily had so many of these fish destroyed, was it not better to let them be used rather than be thrown back into the sea and altogether wasted 1 His first point was that they could not by any legislation prevent the catching and destruction of a great many small fish in the course of fishing operations.

The next consideration he would impress upon their Lordships was this, that it was a very moot question as to how far any operation of man could make any impression on the number of fish in the sea. Anything that man could do bulked very small in comparison with the destruction of fish caused by other fish, by birds, by whales, porpoises, and so forth. Many scientific observers held the opinion that the operations of man among fish were almost a negligible quantity. That certainly was the opinion held by the late Professor Huxley, who calculated that all the food fish caught by men of all the nations of the world did not amount to more than 5 per cent. of the whole of those fish living in the sea. He (Lord Tweedmouth) did not go so far as to say that he thought the operations of man were of no effect, but he did say that, so far as he was able to judge, those operations were of no effect in limiting the reproductive powers of the sea. He did believe that the operations of man might, temporarily, and in certain places, diminish the number of fish in a particular part of the sea, especially in limited areas where there was more difficulty for the sea to recuperate itself from the supply of fish outside. That was the reason why he had always strongly supported the prohibition of trawling in the territorial waters.

The third consideration he would press upon their Lordships was that they should realise the enormous reproductive power of the fish themselves, and also their methods of spawning. An ordinary sized sole would have about 50,000 eggs, and a good sized turbot would have 2,000,000 or upwards of eggs in it. The whole process of the hatching out of spawn was carried out with the spawn held in suspension in the water. It was carried about by the winds, the currents, and the waves. The same thing applied to the young fish after they were first hatched; they were all carried about in the water, and were the prey of every sort of fish and bird. The destruction of spawn by being used as food by all sorts of creatures that inhabited the sea was something enormous. It had been conclusively proved that in the course of this operation a large quantity of the spawn and the young flat fish were carried across to the other side of the North Sea, to the comparatively shallow water bordering on the coast of Holland and to the east side of the North Sea, where there were great sandbanks which seemed to have become very favourite nurseries for these young fish. Again, too, he would remind their Lordships that when these fish were hatched out of the eggs they were not flat fish, but round fish, and did not become fiat fish until they reached a certain size and settled at the bottom. That operation went on to a very large extent in the eastern waters of the North Sea, and at certain seasons of the year these waters were perfectly swarming with small fish.

These grounds were open to the fishermen of every other nation just as they were to the fishermen of this country, and they would see it stated in the Report of their Lordships' Committee that the ideal method would be to have a convention between all the Powers in the North Sea which would deal with this subject and prevent the catching of small fish on the banks. That, however, might be a counsel of perfection. As he understood, Lord Onslow desired to do what he could at any rate to protect these nurseries of small flat fish from the operations of the fishermen of this country. They must all recognise that they could not prevent fishing there. They could not say that these men should not fish there. The only thing they could do was by some means or other to secure that it should not be worth their while to go there. That was the method which had been adopted in the Bill, but the Bill gave the fisheries authorities the power to forbid the landing of small flat fish in this country from all vessels. He thought that was going too far. It was giving a power that was not necessary and a power which the Department would say themselves they did not intend to use. They only wanted to have it in case they might like to use it. What they wanted to do was to prevent those vessels which fished at certain seasons of the year on these particular grounds from landing small fish, in the hope that they would not find it worth their while to go there during the months in which the landing of the small fish was prohibited. The clause, as at present drafted, read— The Board of Agriculture and Fisheries may, if they think it expedient so to do for the purpose of preventing the destruction of undersized flat fish, make orders for prohibiting, either absolutely or subject to such exceptions and conditions as may be prescribed, the landing of any flat fish not exceeding the prescribed length. He proposed by his Amendment to omit all the words after the word "prohibiting." and to insert in their place the following words— the landing from steam trawlers, steam carriers, and sailing smacks with auxiliary power or of 65 tons and upwards, of turbot and brill not exceeding 13 inches in length, and of soles and plaice not exceeding 11 inches in length. He believed those were the only vessels which could possibly fish in these particular waters, and that if they limited it to them they would get all the good they could out of their proposal, and would make it perfectly clear to the owners of. and the fishermen working in. the smaller fishing-boats that it was not intended to at all interfere with them. He desired to limit the powers of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries to dealing for this purpose with only certain vessels. With regard to the second part of his Amendment fixing the size below which fish should not be landed, the Bill at present left the limit to be laid down absolutely to the discretion of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries. He did not see any necessity for that at all. He thought a size should be definitely named in the Bill, and that the Department should not be allowed to go above that size, though they should have power to fix a size below the maximum laid down. He moved his Amendment in all friendliness towards the Bill, believing that, so far from injuring the measure, it would make it sounder and more efficient.

Amendment moved— In Clause 1, page 1, line 7, to leave out from the word 'prohibiting' to the word 'pro- vided 'in line 10, and to insert the words' the landing from steam trawlers, steam carriers, and sailing smacks with auxiliary power or of sixty-five tons and upwards, of turbot and brill not exceeding 13 inches in length, and of soles and plaice not exceeding 11 inches in length."—(Lord Tweedmouth.)

LORD HENEAGE

was afraid he could not agree with his noble friend that this Amendment would be of any assistance in passing the Bill. He thought it would have a contrary effect. The point they had before them was an extremely narrow one—namely, whether they were going to put a limit into the Bill with regard to the size of the fish and the boats. They had had various Bills before them at different times, and they had all been wrecked on exactly this point when they got to the House of Commons. The proposal now was to give powers to the Department so that they might use them in an experimental way in order to prevent the destruction of small fish. He believed that if they placed in the Bill the limits proposed it would meet the same fate as previous measures. He could not help regretting that after the exhaustive discussion that had taken place in Committee, and after the Amendment had been defeated there by six to one, his noble friend should have thought it necessary to bring it forward again in their Lordships' House. Wishing, as he did. to see the Bill passed through the other House, he strongly opposed the Amendment being inserted. He also objected to it on a second ground. As his noble friend had said, the ideal state of things was a convention of all the nations concerned, and he believed that to put an Amendment of this kind into the Bill and thereby prevent the Government from having a free hand in experiments, and in joining other nations in experiments, would be a fatal mistake. He did not believe that the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries would want to exercise undue powers; he did not believe that they would desire in the slightest degree to injure the trade. Of one thing, however, he was quite certain—that the trade at this moment was pretty well able to take care of itself, and the President of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries would have a bad time if he attempted to go beyond the requirements and necessities of the case. It was for these reasons that he strongly opposed taking away from the Department the power of exercising a free hand. Moreover, if they adopted the Amendment they would be going in the teeth of their own Report, which declared that it was very desirable to give the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries a free hand.

* THE PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE AND FISHERIES (The Earl of ONSLOW)

said he welcomed the friendly spirit in which the noble Lord opposite had greeted the Bill. He quite understood that the Amendment which had been suggested to their Lordships was couched in terms which the noble Lord believed might facilitate the passage of the Bill in another place. But he would venture to point out to the noble Lord that there were many classes of persons engaged in the fishing industry, and it was quite possible that if they passed an Act preventing interference with trawlers of sixty-five tons or under a great many who now took a lively interest in the passing of this measure would cease to do so. They must recollect that the very large steam trawling industry would strongly object to a possibility of sailing-vessels coming in and fishing where they were either prohibited from going or where it would be useless for them to go if they could not land fish under a certain size limit. The noble Lord had quite correctly described the object of the Government in introducing the Bill. It was not proposed to prevent the destruction of every small flat fish in the North Sea. There were a very large number of His Majesty's subjects who exercised a calling which provided them with a somewhat precarious living and which necessitated the capture and even the sale of a number of small fish. The Bills which had been introduced in former sessions had invariably been directed at the act of sale. The object of this Bill was to protect not the whole, but a large portion of the small fiat fish in the North Sea. The idea was that by an order of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries it should be made no longer worth the while of the large steam trawlers to go to the eastern grounds where small fish most abounded. But if it was to be limited exclusively to steam trawlers and to the very large sail- ing trawlers, the day might come when the smaller vessels of sixty-four tons and under might say that here was a rich ground to which the large steam vessels were debarred from going, and they would go there and reap the harvest which was denied to the larger vessels. He did not think it would be necessary for the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries to put in operation an order which would affect any other vessels than those described in the Amendment of the noble Lord. At the same time he thought it would be rash if Parliament were to deprive the Department of elasticity of powers in regard both to the vessels and the size of the fish. As regarded the latter point his noble friend was well aware that the evidence given before the Committee tended to show that there was considerable variation in the size of small fish at different periods and at different times, and that a size limit which would be perfectly efficient to-day might not be so ten years hence. Again, the North Sea was not the only part of the coast of these islands where it might be desirable to protect undersized fish. He had received a representation only the other day from the Solway Firth in which he was strongly urged that a limit of eight inches for plaice and soles would be heartily welcomed by all those who fished there. He did not say that the moment had arrived when that should be done, but he thought that where there was a general consensus of opinion in I favour of adopting a size limit in any part of the territorial waters the Department over which he presided ought not to be debarred from giving effect to the wishes of those who fished in the particular waters concerned.

It was quite true that his Board had only recently taken over the Fisheries Department, but they had exercised powers of a very similar nature for many years past in the interests of agriculturists. They had had to impose orders which no doubt at first were considered somewhat onerous and vexatious, but ho ventured to think that the Board of Agriculture had never gone beyond the mature opinion of the agriculturists of the country, and that the orders had always been framed in the interests, and with the general consent, of those for whom they were acting. He therefore asked their Lordships to believe that in the matter of fisheries the Board would not act in any manner different from that in which they had acted in agricultural matters. He would have no objection to accepting the Amendment if he thought that it would be easy to persuade Parliament next session, or in any succeeding session, to give such further powers as experience might prove to be necessary, but the fishing industry had been suing at the doors of Parliament for years past, and many Bills had been introduced not only by private Members but by the representative of the Board of Trade in both Conservative and Liberal Administrations, but none of those measures had ever passed into law. With that experience before them it would, he thought, be most unwise to tie the hands of the Department in the hard-and-fast manner proposed by the noble Lord, more especially as the Select Committee, of which the noble Lord was a member, had added a clause to the Bill which so far curtailed the powers of the Department in this direction as to provide that no order of the Board should come into force until it had been laid on the Table of both Houses of Parliament and every opportunity given for its consideration, and, if necessary in the interest of the fishing industry, its alteration. With that safeguard given to Parliament he thought they might safely entrust to the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries elastic powers, especially in view of the fact, as already stated by Lord Heneage, that the fishing industry was well organised, and that it would be very difficult for the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries to fly in the face of the expressed wishes of that industry.

LORD TWEEDMOUTH

said this demand for a limit with regard to the taking of flat fish was purely a North Sea demand. This Bill had arisen out of a desire that there should be some such arrangements made in regard to the North Sea. The mass of these small fish were on the far side of the North Sea. Unless they could somehow or other induce the nations on the other side of the North Sea to prevent their men fishing on those grounds, His Majesty's Government never would be able to enforce it against their own people. The noble Earl himself, in the Report which he drafted, had made it clear that he looked upon this Bill as a method of giving a lead to other nations. The noble Earl hoped other nations would take a similar course, and that the result would be that the larger vessels of all nations would be induced not to fish in those waters at the time they were so full of small fish. For his part, he would like to see a close time in those waters against all nations. If they thought that by any legislation in this country they were going permanently to exclude the trawlers of Great Britain from fishing there while the waters remained open to French, Danish, and Dutch trawlers, they were mistaken. Therefore he held that it was best to show clearly to foreign nations that they meant only to put a certain restriction on the wholesale catches of fish. Foreign nations, when they saw that it was not proposed to interfere with their small fishermen, would be much more likely to agree to some restriction on their bigger fishing boats. He did not propose to place any limitation whatever on the powers of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries to make whatever regulations they thought fit as to the size of fish to be prohibited from being landed, except that he wished to provide that they should not prohibit the landing of turbot and brill above thirteen inches in length and of soles and plaice over eleven inches in length, at which size they were quite marketable

* THE EARL OF ONSLOW

said the bulk of the evidence went to show that there was practically very little market for small fish on the Continent. Of course, it would be in the power of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries to prohibit the landing of undersized fish from foreign ships of any tonnage.

LORD TWEEDMOUTH

said that in his opinion the evidence on the first point was conflicting.

On Question, Amendment negatived.

Verbal Amendment agreed to.

* THE EARL OF ONSLOW

said that the next Amendment standing in his name was merely to enable the Board to make use, for the purposes of carrying out the Act, of the officers appointed by the fisheries committees round the coast.

Amendment moved— In Clause 1, line 23, after the word 'or' to insert the words 'any fishery officer appointed under the Sea Fisheries Regulation Act, 1888, or, in England or Wales, any officer appointed in that behalf.'"—(The Earl of Onslow.)

On Question, Amendment agreed to.

* THE EARL OF ONSLOW

explained that there were a number of different kinds of soles, and he proposed to insert the scientific title of the common sole—namely, solea vulgaris—for the purpose of avoiding any possible misdescription.

Amendment moved— In Clause 1, page 2, line 10, after the word sole' to insert the words solea vulgaris'."—(The Earl of Onslow.)

On Question, Amendment agreed to.

* THE EARL OF ONSLOW

said the object of the next Amendment standing in his name was to apply the Act to Scotland.

Amendment moved— In Clause 1, page 2, line 21, after the word 'Fisheries' to insert the words 'and a reference to the Sea Fisheries Regulation (Scotland) Act, 1895, shall be substituted for the reference to the Sea Fisheries Resulation Act, 1888.' "—( The Earl of Onslow.)

On Question, Amendment agreed to.

* THE EARL OF ONSLOW

said his next Amendment was drafted with the object of giving to the City of London the same powers as were possessed by the county councils, the City Corporation having, within its jurisdiction, the only fish markets existing in the Metropolis.

Amendment moved— In Clause 1, page 2, after line 21, to insert the words 'In the application of this section to the administrative county of London references to the "mayor, aldermen, and commons of the city of London in common council assembled" shall be substituted for references to the council of a county or borough.'"—(The Earl of Onslow.)

On Question, Amendment agreed to.

Clause 1, as amended, agreed to.

Clause 2:—

LORD TWEEDMOUTH

said that in his last Amendment he had endeavoured to limit the powers of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries, but in the Amendment which he now moved, he desired to extend those powers. If the opening words of Clause 2, which he proposed to delete, remained in the clause the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries would be limited, so far as this clause was concerned, to matters affecting the prevention of the destruction of undersized flat fish. He desired these words cut out because he thought the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries should have power over every kind of fish in the sea all round the coast. Already they had in different parts of England a number of sea fisheries committees, which had done an immense amount of useful work, especially those in Lancashire and Northumberland; and he thought it would be a great advantage if the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries had the power of securing uniformity wherever possible between the action of; the various fisheries committees. He thought it would be a good thing for the Board to have concurrent powers with those committees as to regulations, which would enable them to fill in the gaps where fisheries committees did not exist at present, or where they might fall in in the future. The noble Earl would be well advised in taking this additional power for his Board, and he, therefore, trusted ho would see his way to accept the Amendment.

Amendment moved— In Clause 2, page 2, line 33, to leave out the words 'for the purpose of preventing the destruction of any undersized flat fish'."—(Lord Tweedmouth.)

* THE MARQUESS OF HUNTLY

hoped that His Majesty's Government would see their way to accept the Amendment. It seemed to him that to confine the Bill simply to the prevention of the destruction of immature fish was rather a timid action on the part of the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries, and he thought it would be a good thing if opportunity were taken of this Bill to enable the Board to secure the powers which the noble Lord proposed should be given to them. At the present time there were many anomalies existing. Foreign trawlers, for instance, that fished in the Moray Firth were allowed to land the. fish in English ports, whilst they were precluded from landing them in Scottish ports. This Amendment would give to the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries power to assimilate the various by-laws. He understood that the same thing was going on in the Clyde, where waters which were closed to home trawlers by the order of the Fisheries Board were being fished by trawlers under a foreign flag, and the fish were being landed in Lancashire, where a very extensive market was being got for them. That was an anomaly which was creating very great heartburning in Scotland. Their experiments were useless as long as foreign vessels were allowed to go there and catch fish and land them in England. Therefore he thought it would be wise for the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries to take the powers which the Amendment would give them to remove this anomaly. Lord Tweedmouth had been told that the Committee were six to one against him in regard to his first Amendment, but on the subject which their Lordships now had before them the Committee were unanimously in favour of something being done, for in their Report they declared that it was desirable that so far as possible there should be greater uniformity of bylaws round the whole of the coast, and they expressed the opinion that Clause 2 of the Bill would tend in that direction. It was true quite that the clause would tend in that direction, but, if the words which the noble Lord proposed to strike out were left in, it limited the Bill to the prevention of the destruction of undersized flat fish. He hoped that if the numbers in the House were sufficient the noble Lord would divide on the Amendment, and that if there were not a sufficient number of noble Lords present to go to a division, he would bring it up at a future stage.

LORD HENEAGE

said his noble friend had apparently forgotten that by international law foreigners were entitled to fish at a distance of three miles from the shore outside the territorial waters, and that neither any by-law in Scotland or any where else could possibly prevent them. Having that right, the noble Lord asked the House to deprive them of the right of selling their fish in English ports, which they had always up to the present time enjoyed and which was hoped—and hoped sometimes in vain—would encourage them to give to British trawlers the same right in their ports. The Bill, as introduced and read a second time, was to prevent the destruction of undersized fish, and it had been thoroughly thrashed out before a Select Committee on that principle. Witnesses were never called with regard to any other question except to the best way of stopping the destruction of undersized flat fish. To now put in the Bill a clause which would be a red rag to every fisherman round the coast would be a great mistake. He hoped uniformity might be promoted amongst the various fishery committees, but he did not wish to see this Bill turned into one for enforcing by-laws which the English fisherman objected to so much.

* THE EARL OF ONSLOW

said he did not know which to admire most, the solicitude of the noble Lord opposite to protect the fishermen of the country from the tyranny of the Board of Agriculture or the confidence which he reposed in that Board in his desire to give it power to make by-laws on any subject connected with fishing round the whole of the coast. He viewed with some misgiving the idea of throwing open the Bill to other purposes than that of the prevention of the destruction of undersized flat fish. A great deal of what his noble friend aimed at in regard to the uniformity of by-laws was already provided, for there was power given to the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries to make bylaws themselves in cases where there were no fishery committees, and to assimiliate the by-laws which existed so far as they applied to undersized fish. The noble Marquess opposite had alluded to the anomaly of foreign vessels not being permitted to land fish in Scotland but being permitted to land them in England. He admitted that that was an anomaly, but he did not think it would be proper to deal with it in a Bill of this sort. It should be dealt with in an entirely separate measure. He had considerable sympathy with the views of his noble friend, though he was afraid he had not quite as much sympathy with the policy which closed the Moray Firth to British trawlers. But, be that as it might, he did not think it would be wise to extend the scope of the Bill.

LORD TWEEDMOUTH

said he did not wish to force powers on the Board of Agriculture and Fisheries which they did not wish to possess, and he would not, therefore, persist in his Amendment. But he thought it was an anomalous state of things that all round the coast they had fishery committees able to deal with all sorts of fishing in their jurisdiction, whilst the principal Department in London had only power in regard to the prevention of the destruction of undersized flat fish. Surely they might have equal powers with the sea fishery committees to deal with the catching of round fish as well as flat fish.

Amendment, by leave of the Committee, withdrawn.

Clause 2 agreed to.

Standing Committee negatived.

The House adjourned at five minutes before Seven o'clock, to Thursday next, half-past Ten o'clock.