HL Deb 11 February 1971 vol 315 cc323-9

7.21 p.m.

BARONESS TWEEDSMUIR OF BELHELVIE rose to move, That the Salmon and Migratory Trout (Prohibition of Fishing) Order 1971, be approved. The noble Baroness said: My Lords, I beg to move the Motion standing in my name on the Order Paper. This Order, a copy of which was laid before your Lordships' House on January 28, 1971, does three things. First, it extends for a further two years the prohibition on drift net fishing for salmon and migratory trout in an area of sea off the coast of Scotland and the Tweed. Secondly, it extends the nature of this prohibition to include certain other specified methods of fishing; and, thirdly, it takes account of last year's negotiations in the North East Atlantic Fisheries Commission about high seas fishing for salmon. The changes in the form and content of the Order, as compared with the former Extension Orders with which your Lordships' House is familiar, are due to the inclusion in it of provisions arising from these international negotiations.

My Lords, in 1962, for reasons well known to your Lordships, we imposed a prohibition on drift net fishing for salmon in an area off Scotland. The prohibition was to last for two and a half years, but it was extended by the Government of noble Lords opposite on four occasions. I therefore seek your Lordships' agreement to a further extension of the ban for two years, which is provided for in Article 4 and Part II of the Schedule to the Order, though there are certain changes which I feel I should explain.

These changes result from the international negotiations on the high seas fisheries for salmon which have developed in recent years. These were carried out in the North East Atlantic Fisheries Commission, the international body which covers the North Sea, the North East Atlantic and the area around the British Isles. In May of last year this Commission made certain recommendations for regulation of fishing for salmon in its area, the regulations to apply in 1971 and 1972. These were to be reviewed if substantial changes occurred in catches of salmon on the high seas or in home waters or in the fish stocks. These recommendations included the establishment of two completely closed areas off Northern Norway, a closed season for salmon fishing outside national fishery limits from July 1 to May 5 in certain areas, including waters around the United Kingdom, and other measures, such as minimum-size limits on salmon and mesh of nets, and prohibition of fishing for salmon by trawls, or trolls or monofilament nets.

Although these recommendations did not go so far as the United Kingdom would have wished at the time, they were nevertheless useful. But they cannot be carried out precisely as they stand, since the powers to regulate size limits of fish and mesh of nets do not apply to sea fishing for salmon. This Order therefore imposes a complete prohibition on all fishing for salmon in the Convention area around the British Isles as a whole but outside national fishery limits. This is instead of carrying into effect the detailed recommendations, which would themselves merely have allowed our fishermen to seek salmon for only about seven or eight weeks in the year and then be subject to the various restrictions on gear and fishing methods. In practice, British fishermen do not fish for salmon in the area that would be open for this short period, so it is no real hardship to close off the area altogether. We thought that this was the easiest way to do it, and it is done by Article 3 and Part I of the Schedule to the Order.

Your Lordships will agree perhaps that it would be odd indeed to prohibit all methods of salmon fishing outside the 12-mile limit, to prohibit drift netting inside that limit, but to allow the other methods to be used inside the limit. Therefore it seems sensible to make the two areas the same. But we cannot introduce a similar general ban inside the limit, since this would interfere with certain traditional methods of salmon fishing. What we have done, therefore, is to specify a number of methods of fishing for salmon which may not be used inside the fishery limits, and by so doing we have extended the ban in this area beyond drift netting to cover also, so far as possible, the other methods which were described by the Commission. So, apart from individual and unsuccessful experiments some time ago, these methods have not in fact been used for fishing for salmon. We shall also make known before long what we propose to do about the Hunter Report. In the meantime, I trust that your Lordships will approve this Order. My Lords, I beg to move.

Moved, That the Salmon and Migratory Trout (Prohibition of Fishing) Order 1971, be approved.—(Baroness Tweedsmuir of Belhelvie.)

7.26 p.m.

LORD HUGHES

My Lords, I wish to thank the noble Baroness, Lady Tweedsmuir of Belhelvie, for her brief but perfectly satisfactory explanation of this Order. She referred to the fact that the previous Government had extended the ban on drift net fishing on a number of occasions. That is perfectly correct. During that time, however, a great deal of work was done in trying to find ways in which the recommendations of the Hunter Committee, either as put forward or in variation, might be put into operation in Scotland with the maximum degree of support—because as the noble Baroness is well aware, it is difficult to find suggested changes in the law which do not meet with opposition from one section or another of the affected community.

A great deal of progress was made during that time, and I think I should not be wrong in saying that had the Election resulted otherwise we should now have been in a position to put before Parliament our proposals on the implementation or otherwise of the Hunter Committee. I am quite certain that we should have done exactly as the noble Baroness has done, extending the ban for another two years. All I would do, therefore, is to ask the noble Baroness whether she expects that at some time during this extension of two years the Government will come forward with firm proposals on what they suggest should be the permanent solution of this admittedly difficult problem.

7.28 p.m.

VISCOUNT THURSO

My Lords, I suppose I should begin by declaring a fairly obvious interest, in that my title derives from the name of a famous Scottish salmon river. I have infinite joy in managing that salmon river from source to sea, including its estuary fishing, its rod fishings and its hatchery. I can there- fore say that from a practical point of view I welcome this Order, because with it come a number of other Orders controlling fishing for Atlantic salmon in other parts of the Atlantic, and because, as the noble Baroness has told us, this represents a measure of international agreement between countries of the North East Atlantic and North West Atlantic which are interested in the Atlantic salmon.

There are, however, two points that I would raise, though the noble Baroness has already partially answered the first by saying that the Hunter Report will not be dropped with a dull thud and an audible sign of relief into her wastepaper basket, but that Her Majesty's Government will, in fact—shortly, as I hope—be coming forward with positive suggestions based upon the tremendous amount of research that was represented in the Hunter Report. I hope that when this is done we shall see the salmon law of Scotland based not upon 19th century conceptions backed by mediæval notions but upon something a little mote 20th century, and that we shall see a general tidying up of the law of salmon fishing, salmon management, and fishing for salmon around our coasts.

The other point I should like to raise is this. In these arrangements, which were reached internationally, there were two hopes expressed which could not be given specific effect to as they were the province of the sovereign States involved in the Convention. One was the hope that each State involved in reaching agreement on the fishing for salmon on the high seas would also take steps to control the fisheries inside their own territorial waters. I hope that we shall be able to watch this situation through the Commissions, and so forth, who are watching the fisheries on the high seas.

The other hope was that countries around the North Atlantic would try to add to the population of salmon by implanting smolts. This is a subject which some people have tried to say is not proved scientifically and which they have tried to belittle. It is indeed a subject which can be of enormous interest to all countries which breed the Atlantic salmon. From our own experience on the Thurso River, I am perfectly convinced that one can greatly increase the run of smolts to the sea. I maintain that it is no coincidence that, during the last six years, when the catches of many rivers have not been as good as people would have liked to see, and have not been as good as they have been in the past, our catches have been 20 per cent. up on the long average going back to the 19th century. I maintain that it is not unconnected with our efforts to rear salmon in a specially cleared loch, and in certain selected parts of the upper waters of the river.

I should like to see Her Majesty's Government give more encouragement to this sort of thing, because we in the Thurso have tried to interest the Fresh Water Fisheries Laboratory in our experiments, and have indeed offered them facilities to work alongside us on these experiments, and these offers have not been taken up. I made an offer to the last Government 'to take over a river which belongs to the country, the River Strathy, and to carry out improvements on it, particularly improvements to water storage, to the actual mouth of the river and the construction of pools. This offer to manage the river was refused, and instead we were given an assurance that more licences would be issued to catch the average catch of 36 salmon which come out of that river.

I hope that this prohibition of certain types of fishing on the high seas will encourage us not merely to sit back and think that we have done a job for the protection of the Atlantic salmon, but that it will merely be a point from which we will look forward to increasing the usefulness of this great natural resource, because if we really tried we could double the number of smolts running to sea out of the rivers of the British Isles. I am quite convinced of this. I am also quite convinced that an enormous amount of work needs to be done to increase the number of salmon which go into the North Atlantic. Therefore, I hope that Her Majesty's Government will be able to give us assurances that not only will the fisheries for salmon in the sea and in the rivers be looked at from the point of view of preserving what we have, but that primarily they will be looked at as an area in which we can improve an already great asset.

LORD INGLEWOOD

My Lords, I have no interest in any salmon river to declare, nor am I a fisherman, but I have some interest in the legislation from which this Order springs. I was Parliamentary Secretary in 1962 when the Bill was introduced, and I remember the opposition in Committee in another place, the prolonged debates and the claims that what we then proposed to do would not work and was grossly unfair. I am an extremely happy man this evening to hear all these speeches from all parts of the House in support of what we then proposed.

7.35 p.m.

BARONESS TWEEDSMUIR OF BELHELVIE

My Lords, I do not think any other noble Lord wishes to speak, and therefore I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, the noble Viscount, Lord Thurso, and my noble friend Lord Inglewood for taking part in this brief debate. I would say to my noble friend Lord Inglewood, that of course it is very good to see agreement on legislation in which he had some original hand—perhaps in drafting—in the first place.

On the major question which was raised by the noble Lord, Lord Hughes, on the Hunter Report, it is quite true that his Government took some time to consider the Hunter Report. It was published in 1965 and the Election was in 1970. Therefore, if I have it right, that is five years of careful and close examination, and leaving no stone unturned.

LORD HUGHES

My Lords, if the noble Baroness will excuse me, she has not quoted me exactly. I did not say that we had taken all this time to consider this Report. I said that we had done a considerable amount of work, and even allowing the usual conventions to a new Government, it does not seem to me that the civil servants in St. Andrew's House started all over again in June, 1970, doing the work which they had been doing in the two or three years previously.

BARONESS TWEEDSMUIR OF BELHELVIE

My Lords, I am sure that the noble Lord worked very hard on the Hunter Report, but I would recall to him that my right honourable friend the Secretary of State has always taken a personal interest in this particular Report, and indeed has made many speeches upon it. Therefore, I can certainly give the assurance for which he asks, that within the period of this particular Order—which is, after all, two years—we shall most certainly give views on what we should like to do with the Hunter Report, and that it will not be dropped into the waste paper basket as the noble Viscount, Lord Thurso, thought. Therefore, I should think that, even if the noble Lord only started in the last term of office, which I suspect he did not, we might be just a little bit quicker.

The noble Viscount, Lord Thurso, spoke from great personal knowledge of fishing from one of the most famous fishing rivers in Scotland, and we all recognise the work that he has done to try to improve the smolts in his river. I would quite agree with him that, quite apart from this Order, which controls certain types of fishing both outside and inside the limits, we ought also to be considering very seriously how we can improve stocks. As he rightly said, the North-East Atlantic Fisheries Commission recommended that all those States which were party to the Convention should do their best to plant smolts. So far as we are concerned, my Department's Fresh Water Fisheries scientists, as part of our programme of research, are setting up an experimental smolt-rearing station, and I hope that in time we shall see results similar to what he has managed to achieve on his own. I am sorry if, as he says, he has not had a visit from any of the scientists from the research station. I understood that some of the advice that had been given to him came from the Department's scientists. We shall have to see what can be done about that in the future.

To all noble Lords who have been good enough to welcome this Order, I should like to say that before I came into this House I really had the most terrible nightmare, because first of all it was Hospital Endowments Trust, then Traffic Wardens, and then of course it was the Salmon and Migratory Trout. I suddenly had the nightmare that all the traffic wardens would be directing the salmon and the migratory trout, and they would all be put into a trust and redistributed.