HL Deb 30 March 1976 vol 369 cc998-1016

2.46 p.m.

The MINISTER of STATE, SCOTTISH OFFICE (Lord Kirkhill)

My Lords, I beg to move that this Bill be now read a second time. The purpose of this Bill is to encourage an increase in the amount of trout fishing available on a permitted basis. There are many people who wish to fish for trout in Scotland, but, not having waters of their own, are unable to do so; either they cannot find waters which they are permitted to fish, the charges are prohibitive for them, or the permit conditions are too restrictive. As noble Lords will have noted, a "proposal"—to use the term in the Bill—can evoke a response from the Government of statutory protection to trout fishings. I say advisedly "trout". The Bill of course refers to all freshwater fish, but defines these so as to exclude salmon and sea trout, which are already protected. But the main objective is to improve trout fishing opportunities. If it did not cover other freshwater fishing—that is, for coarse fish—it would leave a loophole in the protection it offers. It would be too easy in many places for anglers fishing for trout to maintain that they were innocently trying to catch coarse fish such as pike or greyling, to name but two.

In offering the opportunity of obtaining protection for trout fishings under this Bill, our aim is of course not to enhance the capital value of private property rights. But as every angler knows, very many rivers and lochs could provide better fishing if they were restocked, and if physical improvements were carried out to the banks and fishing effort was related reasonably to what the stocks would bear. It is very difficult for clubs or individual owners to do any of these things, unless they are motivated by pure philanthropy, without having control over access. Furthermore, without such control, it cannot be too long before our present widespread stocks of trout will drastically decrease under the ever-increasing angling pressure upon them. So the offer of protection to riparian owners and clubs holding waters—or such of them as prove willing in return to offer increased and better access to trout anglers—should benefit both anglers and proprietors by leading to the improvement of fishings. It may, indeed, lead to some small increase in rural employment, because men will be needed to undertake the management of this, but I do not suggest that it would be very great.

Noble Lords will see that the Bill offers protection only if the Secretary of State for Scotland, having received proposals offering access to freshwater fishings in an area, first, is satisfied that a significant increase in the fishing available on permit will be forthcoming on the waters which are the subject of the access proposals when these are implemented; secondly, has consulted a body which he is satisfied is fully representative of all types of persons wishing to fish for trout in Scotland; and, thirdly, is satisfied also that if the proposals are implemented a reasonable amount of fishing will be avail- able.In this context "reasonable" relates to the demand from people wishing to fish in the area on a permit basis.

Where these criteria cannot be met, the angling situation will remain unchanged, as there will be no question of protection being given under the Bill. But, where they are met, a protection order can be made. Some flexibility is necessary in this, of course. For example, there may be times when it would be convenient to cover only part of a large river system, or on the other hand more than one river, or to deal separately with large lochs or with complexes of lochs. But the normal "area" will be a whole river system bounded by the natural watersheds. To use a term now coming into use in another context, we should be seeking to define the area by hydrological boundaries.

There has been some criticism in another place that under such an arrangement protection will be given to some riparian owners who are not prepared for their part to offer any increase of access to trout fishers. But to debar such estate waters from protection within a large protected area—as was proposed in the White Paper, Salmon and Freshwater Fisheries in Scotland (Cmnd. 4821), presented by the Conservative Administration in November 1971—would, in the Government's view, lead to piece-meal protection. This would cause great confusion about which parts of a river were protected; few people would know the exact state of the law at any one place, and it would take considerable central administrative effort to keep track of the individual agreements and access arrangements involved. On the other hand, if no protection was given to an area without the unanimous offer of access from all holders of fishing rights in the area, then I very much fear that the Bill would turn out to be a completely dead letter.

The principal provisions of the Bill are contained in Clause 1. This clause not only spells out the criteria which must be met before any protection will be given, but provides for the obtaining of full information by the Secretary of State for Scotland to enable him to decide on the worth-whiteness of the access being offered so that he may make up his mind as to whether it merits the giving of protection. It also ensures that, once protection has been given, he can call to account all those who offered access to inform him as to how they are implementing the proposals which they submitted to him. If he is not satisfied, then he has full powers to revoke the order.

Reasonable rules must of course be enforceable if better fishing is to be enjoyed by those taking advantage of the opportunities offered under the Bill. Otherwise overfishing of better stocked waters will occur and those who have paid for permits to fish would be fully justified in complaining. The Bill therefore allows the Secretary of State to appoint wardens from persons nominated by the holders of fishing rights in the area of a protection order and prescribes their powers. It is left to the proprietors and clubs themselves to provide the wardens, as well as to carry out the other elements of management. The powers given to wardens by the Bill are the absolute minimum which it is considered they need to enable them to deter people from fishing without permission. There may be some noble Lords who feel strongly that these powers should be increased; on the other hand, others may feel the opposite. The Government commend them as being sufficient without being unduly draconian. It must be remembered that fishing for trout without permission has hitherto been no infraction of either the criminal or civil law in Scotland unless attended by aspects which brought it within the law of trespass on private property. To make it an offence is a big enough step without putting it straight into the serious crime category and arming people, many of whom may be part-timers, with over-strong enforcement powers.

Clause 4 of the Bill improves the legal status of the right of freshwater fishing in Scotland. Up till now these rights have not been enforceable against a new owner on a change occurring in the ownership of the land adjoining the water. Although an angling club could obtain the agreement of a proprietor to the club using his waters, any such agreement automatically lapsed on a change of proprietor. In these circumstances, tenants such as clubs were not encouraged to develop their fishings. Nor could they commit themselves to longer-term proposals offering fishing to meet the public demand—something vital to the Bill's purpose. For these reasons, the Bill provides that written contracts entered into for a consideration and lasting more than a year will be leases recognised under Scottish law. They will consequently be binding throughout the period of the lease, and the rights of fishing so authorised will be dealt with as a heritable property under the law of contract, succession and so on.

The Hunter Committee in 1965 recommended the formation of a Scottish Anglers Trust. Under that Committee's recommendations, there was much more for such a Trust to do than there is under this present Bill. But we still see advantage in a central voluntary organisation whose primary objective would be to acquire the control of fishings with a view to making them available on a permit basis at a reasonable cost to persons wishing to fish for trout. There might come a time when the Trust could spread itself to salmon fishings, but we would see its primary concern as being trout fishing. It could take over and develop fishing held both by proprietors not interested in their fishings and public bodies willing to have such an organisation manage their water for fishing. Sometimes the Trust would have to buy fishings; at other times it would be able to rent them; others might even be gifted to it. We do not envisage large sums of money being required, but it would need funds for these and other expenses. The Government are convinced that angling must be self supporting and that a Trust must be in the long-term self-financing through subscriptions from its members and income from its activities. But we accept that there must be some injection of public funds to set it up and allow it to get along. The Bill therefore provides in Clause 5 for financial contributions to such an organisation, if and when it is set up, during the first three years of its existence, and the Government are prepared to provide up to £160,000 for this purpose.

The remaining clauses of the Bill are really incidental to its main purpose. Clause 6 provides for the updating of penalties relating to offences against salmon and freshwater fisheries conservation legislation. It is now almost a quarter of a century since any of these were quantified and many were last fixed in the 19th century. Both in themselves and compared with penalties for similar offences in England and Wales, they are out of date. Similar penalties in England and Wales were revised in 1972. It is clearly desirable that in Scotland we should bring ours up to a more realistic level. Generally, what is being done is to increase fines and, except for offences relating to gang poaching, to cut out imprisonment.

Clause 7 as far as possible removes the anomalous legal restraints under which our fish farmers are working. These arise from the application to them of legislation conceived purely in terms of the conservation of wild stocks of fish. Such legislation has of course no logical bearing on operations carried out by them relating to wholly managed stocks. Noble Lords will be conscious of the recent demands of fish farmers to be freed from the counter-productive effects of such legislation. Some may wish we had been able to go further. But the Government feel that they have done what they can for the present—and only for Scotland, of course. The removal of other anomalies and the clarification of matters such as the position regarding rights in the sea will have to await more comprehensive or more specific legislation.

I realise that it can be argued that this Bill is a poor response to the wide and comprehensive recommendations of the Hunter Committee. We accept that it is a small one. But I would remind noble Lords that it is now over a decade since that Committee made its report. It is perhaps significant that no other Administration have during that period managed to present any legislation whatsoever to Parliament based on Hunter. Both sides have tried, but without success. There are unfortunately much more pressing matters demanding Parliament's attention in these not too prosperous times. It was with this fully in mind that the present Bill was drafted. It sets out to do no more—and I stress "no more"—than to take a short first step towards securing an increase in the amount of trout fishing available in the rivers of Scotland. I commend this Bill to your Lordships.

Moved, That the Bill be now read 2a.—(Lord Kirkhill.)

3.1 p.m.

Lord CAMPBELL of CROY

My Lords, I should like to thank the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhill, for having explained to us concisely the background to the Bill and its purposes. As he said, it deals with trout in Scotland, and that means the native brown trout. We on this Bench agree with him that legislation is needed to improve trout fishing in Scotland. For too long Scotland has been without much good trout fishing which Scots could have enjoyed, and it could also have been an additional attraction to visitors on holiday to Scotland. Certainly those representing the tourist industry in Scotland have for a long time been hoping for new legislation.

Except in isolated areas in Scotland, it is simply not worth the trouble of clearing weeds, stocking the water, reducing predators, and taking other action to ensure that trout are there to be caught. This is because there is no proper protection against the wholesale removal of trout by mass or individual poaching. The position is different from that in England and Wales where, I understand, there is a system of protection. The protection in Scotland is confined to salmon and sea trout for which, as the Minister said, there is a considerable amount of legislation.

I wish, briefly, to give an accurate description of the position, and I do not think that it could be better set out than as follows: …unauthorised fishing for brown trout in Scotland— is not a statutory offence but is merely an infringement of civil rights. The only action open to a riparian proporietor against unauthorised trout fishing is the cumbersome and relatively ineffective one of applying to the Courts for interdict against individual anglers. This is seldom resorted to, and there is a commonly-held, though mistaken, belief in Scotland that brown trout angling is open to all. That is the position. I was quoting from the White Paper of November 1971, to which the noble Lord referred, which was presented to Parliament by the Secretary of State, who at that time was myself. That was my own White Paper, and that was the part dealing with trout. So in theory there is a method of redress, but in practice it is completely ineffective. The result is that many bodies consider that action should be taken to help anglers who see lochs and rivers, where they think there ought to be good trout because conditions are such as would normally harbour trout, but who find when they fish that there is nothing there.

It is only in remote areas, such as the Orkney Islands, that de facto protection can be secured. For example, there are lochs there where the fishing goes with local hotels, and there is a season when anglers stay at the hotels and fish in those lochs. But because those lochs are far afield from the centres of population, and because the Orcadians (the local people) know how valuable the trout fishing there is to the local community, there is protection, and anybody who was to poach would suffer considerable ignominy vis-à-vis the local population. There are other lochs which can be fished only from boats, and there again control of the boats provides some protection. But that is as far as protection goes; it is de facto for reasons of that kind.

The White Paper from which I have just quoted also dealt with salmon and sea trout—migratory fish. Although there is protection in existing legislation, the question of adding to that protection now raises very weighty problems. For example, the employment of between 1,000 and 2,000 men is directly involved in the net fishings at the mouths of rivers and in the estuaries. I understand why the Government are now tackling only brown trout.

This is a limited, but welcome, measure, and it need not be held back while the Government are considering such issues concerning salmon. None the less, I am sorry, as my White Paper indicated, that we are not able to deal with salmon and sea trout as well. We would have tried to improve the situation for those species also because there is a danger of a serious reduction in stocks. I must declare an interest in speaking in this debate. I own the fishing in part of the River Nairn, a small river, where it flows through the modest amount of land which I own in Nairnshire. Salmon and sea trout, besides brown trout, are in that river. I do not fish myself, being disabled, and it is not a financial interest which I have as I do not let the fishing. I allow fishing on a permit system; that is local anglers from the village of Croy and nearby, and genuine visitors and holiday makers have permits. The permits are free and are there simply to regulate the numbers of people fishing at any time. But this is not entirely philanthropic, because they sometimes present to me the fish that they catch—

Several Noble Lords

Ah!

Lord CAMPBELL of CROY

None the less, my Lords, I pay rates, because salmon fishings in Scotland are rated, and on the whole I lose because the rates are based on the amount of salmon caught.

Fishing for trout has been a neglected Scottish asset. A system is needed to promote more good trout fishing for Scottish anglers and to provide an attractive sport for tourist visitors. The present state of the law in Scotland, as I have described, does not make it worth while stocking or maintaining trout fisheries. What is needed is protection from poaching, in return for proprietors operating satisfactory schemes with reasonable access to the public. On this Bench we are in agreement with the principle of this Bill.

However, I am sorry that other parts of the White Paper of November 1971—providing added protection from over-killing of salmon and sea trout—are not being tackled. Salmon are being subjected now to greater hazards than at any other time. The Government are tackling one fairly non-controversial area, covered by the Hunter Report of 1965. It is not very enterprising, but I am glad that they are doing it. It is certainly better than doing nothing. As the noble Lord said, the difficulty is fitting in legislation at all on this subject when the Parliamentary programme has pressure upon it for more urgent matters to be considered.

I have some comments on the Bill and some criticism of the drafting. Since substantial changes were made at the Report stage the last time this was considered in another place, with apparently little time to think out the changes, I hope that we can help the Government to do some revision. There is a need to make the provisions clearer and to remove some anomalies.

I have been involved with this subject since 1961. The Hunter Committee was appointed in 1962 because of the drift-netting for salmon at sea by sea fishermen, which was then starting. This was a threat to salmon stocks. Salmon have to come up the rivers in order to spawn and reproduce, and when they are swimming towards the river mouths they are near the surface. Therefore, drift nets, nets hanging from floats, each net spreading more than 10 miles if necessary, could have virtually wiped out the salmon population. If, round the mouths of rivers, there had been boats operating for 24 hours out of 24, they could virtually have caught every fish trying to come up the river to spawn. The Hunter Committee recommended very quickly, in an interim report, that the ban which had been placed temporarily on drift netting for salmon should be continued; in their final report in 1965 they confirmed that, and that ban has been continued ever since. It is renewable in Parliament. My Lords, the reason why this happened in the early 'sixties was mainly the use of new materials. Nylon and other strong man-made fibres, which could not be seen by the salmon, meant that it was possible to catch salmon in this way, whereas it had not been in the past.

The main recommendation in the Hunter Committee's Report of 1965 was a radical one. It was that all net fishing in estuaries and at river mouths should be abolished, and that there should be only one trap system in each Scottish river together with an automatic counting device. That was a revolutionary proposal; and it would also have meant the disappearance of about 1,500 jobs—the jobs of the men who operated the nets at present in the firths and at the mouths of rivers. In my White Paper of November 1971 I stated that, after looking into this, a Conservative Administration had found that that particular recommendation was too difficult or impossible to operate in many Scottish rivers, and I discarded it. But we proposed that there should be licensing of such nets, which was also recommended by the Hunter Committee. New methods of netting in estuaries and river mouths, and the new materials, were taking a heavier toll, and there was a danger that the weekly close period for salmon under the Acts was no longer sparing enough fish to go up the river for angling and for reproduction.

Now the Government are not pursuing this, although it is the major problem and was the reason for setting up the Hunter Committee initially. I would therefore ask the noble Lord whether he could tell us when he replies to this debate: Are the Government considering legislation to deal with this important matter besides the Bill which we have before us, which is simply dealing with part of the Hunter Committee's report? Secondly, in the meantime can we assume that the Government intend to continue the ban on drift netting in Scotland, which means orders being brought before Parliament every two years or so? Incidentally, I should point out that there is a difference between the law in Scotland and that South of the Border. In Scotland it is legal to have what are described as fixed engines—that is to say, bag nets and stake nets—in the firths and at the river mouths. That is not allowed in England. However, off the coast of England it is possible to carry out drift netting at various places under licence, so it is controlled in that way. But I think it is worth noting that the systems are completely opposite North and South of the Border.

While considering the provisions concerning trout in this Bill we must have in mind the far more important resource, where Scotland is concerned, of salmon. It is vastly more valuable as a Scottish resource, and in particular as a provider of public funds by way of contributions to local authority rates. Trout and salmon affect each other in rivers. We cannot deal with one species and completely ignore the other. Salmon, as I have mentioned, are at present under pressure, not only from the netting in estuaries but also, unfortunately, from the impact of disease in recent years—udn; ulcerated dermal necrosis. Then there has been the Atlantic fishery off Greenland, where boats belonging to other nations have found the ocean feeding grounds of the salmon and have been able to catch them in great quantity, with possible dangers to stocks.

To give an example of the value of the salmon fisheries to Scotland, may I take the River Spey? Visitors are prepared to pay a lot for fishing for a week or two on a beat of the Spey. Hotels and other enterprises in the area benefit from this, and they also benefit outside the normal summer season, because it begins very early in the year and goes on after the summer holiday season. A large proportion of the money which is paid by the people who enjoy this fishing goes to the local councils. A large proportion goes in rates which are paid, and because the amount of rates is calculated on the basis of the number of fish caught over the previous five years the present position in regard to the Spey can be worked out. Noble Lords might like to knows that, in the current year, each single salmon now being caught in the Spey means a contribution of more than £3 to the local authorities. So everybody in the area should be hoping that as many visitors catch as many salmon as possible, because every single one means more than £3 straight to the local authorities in rates. Now if that source of local revenue were to disappear through the decimation of salmon stocks, this would be a painful wound for local government and would probably mean that central Government would be expected to provide more in grants. I should mention in regard to the River Spey that much of the river is not owned by private proprietors and that the fishing is open to local people and to visitors. There are miles of town water at various places which are open to local anglers for salmon, and also to holidaymarkers.

There are two conclusions from this. First, the Government should not wait for long before tackling the task of modernising salmon legislation to ensure protection of stocks; and, second, in this legislation concerning trout we should take care that we are not doing anything which would seriously damage salmon fisheries. So far as trout are concerned, where there are independent lochs the position is straightforward. A system of controlling the numbers of people fishing, which includes reasonable access by the public and where there is good husbandry of the stocks, should in return have protection from poaching and marauding. That is quite clear, I think, for lochs where they are independent. When we come to rivers, the position is more difficult because fish move. Stocks of fish may be put into one stretch of a river, and they may swim to another. They may go to a part of the river belonging to another riparian owner.

There are also certain conflicts between the interests of brown trout fishing and salmon and sea trout, and these should be avoided. This is an area where the Bill needs clarification. For example, brown trout cat salmon eggs. They are predators of salmon, and it would be a ridiculous situation if under this Bill brown trout were to be put into a river and the stretch of river were to be stocked with brown trout just where the salmon redds were in the gravel, just where the salmon spawn; because they would then be eating the salmon eggs and reducing the stock of salmon in that river—which are a far more valuable asset to Scotland. For similar reasons, river fishery boards in Scotland have a practice of electrically removing predators from burns and small tributaries of rivers where salmon fry are hatching and starting their existence. The predators are not only eels and lampreys but brown trout. Then the stunned brown trout are moved to another part of the river or loch where they can revive and be fished for without having killed off the salmon. Clearly co-ordination is needed. There is nothing in the Bill on that.

This is a trout Bill but, for the reasons that I have given, we cannot ignore salmon, for the damage could be out of all proportion. The principle of the Bill, extending protection for trout fisheries by law as applications for satisfactory schemes are approved, is one with which we agree and which was put forward in that White Paper of 1971. The principal difference between this Bill and those proposals is that the Government are suggesting that whole river systems or catchment areas should be included. I understand the administrative convenience of this, and I understand also why it may be difficult to deal with stretches of river individually. If it is possible, of course it will be best to deal with the whole river as one unit; but there is an objection which was mentioned by the noble Lord and raised in another place during the passage of this Bill. It is that some proprietors could benefit by getting protection without accepting any of the obligations because they refuse to carry out what the Bill requires.

As I have mentioned, where there is a loch or a group of lochs it is easy to isolate them, but where there are rivers it is important to consider all types of fish, including migratory fish and coarse fish, as well as trout. I am not sure that it is necessary that the whole of the river should be treated as a unit for the purpose of a scheme under this Bill. Out of perhaps a hundred individuals and bodies with fishing on a single river, there might be one or two proprietors who would refuse to co-operate. Either they would have a veto on the scheme's going forward or else the scheme would go forward and they would then be receiving the benefits while not themselves complying with the conditions.

In the scheme that we put forward in 1971, we recognised that this problem could be dealt with by a self-adjusting device. If a proprietor was determined to be the odd man out, his stretch of river or his loch was likely in future to be very heavily poached; it was likely to be the target of the poachers because the other waters in the area were receiving the new protection. In such circumstances there was a built-in inducement to that proprietor to join in a reasonable scheme without compulsion.

What we need is legislation to encourage responsible husbandry of trout fisheries and reasonable access for the public. I would ask the Minister also whether an angling club constitutes "the public" for the purpose of the Bill. I presume that the Secretary of State would examine its constitution and rules of membership when he was considering a scheme. This may be a Committee point but it is an important one for the whole application of the Bill.

My Lords, there is another point that I must draw to your attention at this stage. When a whole lot of new wording was introduced into the Bill at the Report stage in another place the following was included at the beginning of Clause 1: Where the Secretary of State is satisfied that, if proposals submitted to him under this section were implemented, there would be a significant increase in access to fishing". The point turns on the word "increase"; because, under that wording, it means that protection will be given only if it can be shown that there is an increase in access for the public. Some proprietors already give full access. The wording would produce a situation where someone who was already carrying out everything which the Bill prescribes would not qualify for protection. This would be penalising the paragon and cannot be what the Government intend. I am sure that re-drafting is needed here to indicate that where everything which the Bill asks for is now being done by somebody, he can get protection as well as somebody else who shows an increase in access for the public.

My Lords, I give a qualified welcome to this Bill and I am sure that both sides of the House would hope that it will provide more and better trout fishing in Scotland. There are many visitors to Scotland, tourists who bring a trout rod and tackle in their cars, and if they are visiting Scotland for the first time I am afraid they are disappointed. They go to inviting-looking lochs and flog the water and find nothing there; and they will be told by the locals that nobody has ever thought it worthwhile to stock or to keep trout there for the reasons I have given. We support the aim of this Bill based on the principle, concerning trout, of the orderly spreading of protection in return for fulfilling certain obligations. We shall have various suggestions for changes at a later stage, but the aim of the Bill is one that we put forward first in 1971 and which we are now glad to see being brought forward in legislation.

3.26 p.m.

Viscount THURSO

My Lords, I should, I suppose, begin by declaring my usual quiverful of interests. I am an angler, I am a proprietor of both trout and salmon fishings, I make them available to the public, I let them to tourists and so on; but I think that my greatest interest in this Bill is in the opportunity it offers to make more of Scottish trout fishing. I am, myself, a tremendous believer in the fact that very much more can be made of many of the trout waters of Scotland. Therefore, I join with the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, in welcoming this Bill, although, like him. I would say that there are a number of drafting Amendments and a certain amount of drafting revision which ought to take place before the Bill is enacted.

I welcome the Bill but, in spite of the lengthy debate in another place, I consider that it contains some very serious flaws. One was mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Kirkhill, when he spoke of a problem of great concern to my friend in another place, Mr. David Steele: the problem that people may get protection without themselves contributing to a total scheme. I think this is something that we want to examine, if not now, certainly at the Committee stage.

The other serious flaws will be the subject of Amendments from these Benches which at a later stage I propose to move and to press. First, let me give my reasons for welcoming the Bill. As a trout angler myself. I welcome the statement by the Scottish Office that they are intending to encourage fishing for trout, the sport of angling, in spite of what was said when the Government introduced the Hare Coursing Bill in another place when they stated that this was the beginning of a drive to do away with all sports, including fishing. I am glad to see that the Scottish Office takes not a blind bit of notice of that final intention and is going to look after the interests of us anglers.

I welcome particularly the giving of legal status to trout fishing. This will undoubtedly give an impetus to the improvement and proper management of this important resource. I do not think that the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, spotted this; but it will also, I am sure, contribute to rates; because if this Bill is enacted trout fishing will become a hereditable property, it will become rateable. If you improve it, make it better, then, presumably, as in the case of your house, the rates will go up. When you restock the loch it will be like putting central heating into your house, thereby increasing the rates. That is fair enough if you get the fishing and the improvement. In itself, this provision will make available more fishing and better quality fishing. It will give hope of return to those who are willing to put effort and money into proper management and improvement schemes.

The basic resources are there in the shape of large areas of totally unimproved waters, and the knowledge of how to bring about the improvements is available. Excellent work has been and is being done in the fresh water fisheries laboratory at Faskally, and I am sure that the scientists there will welcome the opportunity which the Bill will give of seeing a proper use being made of their researches and the facilities which they offer for advice, and so forth, within their laboratories. However it will be important for Her Majesty's Government to see that the laboratory gets enough money and personnel allocated to it in order to be able to cope with the big demand which will be made upon its services and upon its advice after this Bill has been enacted. There is no doubt when improvement schemes are thought out it will be necessary to call in the services of the laboratory at Faskally, and I have no doubt they will be very hard pressed. I hope the Government have taken careful note of this need. It is much more important than setting up a trust to lease or buy fishings; it is much more important to see in the first instance the available places, the available lochs, waters and rivers are in fact given the proper scientific help and advice.

It is right that those who live near and those who own trout fisheries, in accepting this legal status which is being given to them, should give in return a quid pro quo to their less fortunate brother anglers by offering reasonable access to their waters. However, I must emphasise that, in my view, the word "reasonable" has to be interpreted in such a way that there shall be no diminution in standards of quality of any fishery. It would be wrong, for instance, for a traditionally fly-only water to be forced to admit spinning simply because a considerable number of people only know how to spin. If good fly-only water is being made available, then it is worth while for people to learn how to enjoy this much more intriguing branch of trout fishing. However, I do not really expect any Secretary of State for Scotland to be so badly advised as to allow protection orders in terms which would actually be harmful. I merely sound the warning so that those who are hoping to gain access to new fishing waters are prepared to accept that they themselves are entitled to this access only if they exercise a proper standard of conduct and conservation.

So far I have been giving a warm welcome to this Bill, so your Lordships may well be asking yourselves what are the flaws which I see in it. First and foremost, the Bill sets up no organisation, no machinery, no administrative bodies, to implement its provisions. The noble Lord. Lord Kirkhill, told us it will just vaguely be left to proprietors—who may be individuals or angling clubs—to implement the schemes as best they can. I consider this to be a flaw because the Area Boards are conspicuously lacking. We had all expected them to be the focus of the local effort to implement the provisions of a protection order. Most dangerous of all it seems to me is the fact that this Bill will create a new class of official called a warden with powers to enter upon land and demand production of licences, question anglers and seize their tackle. There is absolutely nothing in this Bill to show how the activities of wardens will be supervised or controlled. Once a warden has been appointed, he just tucks his authorisation into his pocket and carries on as he sees fit.

I think we need Area Boards to supervise and, if necessary, train wardens. We need Area Boards to facilitate the sharing of wardens among various fisheries in an area to which a protection order applies, or in order to bring more wardens to the spot if there is need at certain times of year for their services in one part of the protection order area.

Then we need Area Boards to provide a point of contact between district salmon fishery boards and the trout and other fresh water fishing interests in an area which is under a protection order. I suppose at this point I should confess to another interest in that I am the President of the Association of Scottish District Salmon Fishery Boards, and this is a matter of considerable concern in that there are bound to be—as the noble Lord, Lord Campbell of Croy, has already said—certain areas of conflict between the interests of trout and salmon. Therefore a forum should be set up where these areas of conflict can be reconciled. This could best be done through the medium of contact between Area Boards. It would be unacceptable to have two different owners carrying out different and possibly conflicting policies on the same stretch of water, yet this could easily happen. There should be this point of contact between these two interests. On a river bank there might well be three interests: the owner of the land, the agricultural user; the heritable owner of the trout fishery; and a third person would be the heritable owner of the salmon fishery. They may be different people and two of them may have different kinds of "policemen", in the shape of a warden and a water bailiff, acting on the same bank each with powers of search and question, and so on. We need Area Boards in order to resolve this kind of situation.

Area Boards could also be useful for another purpose. After a protection order has been made, and a protection area set up, things will start to change within that area, because that is in the nature of the purpose of making a protection order: you are going to improve the fishings and get more people to fish on them, improvements will be carried out; new schemes will be considered; angling pressures will change and so on. The situation is different in different parts of the country.

The problems on the Tweed are quite different from the problems on the Thurso. So different changes will take place in different parts of the country. Local knowledge will be important in dealing with these problems, and local knowledge will be useful to the Secretary of State. The Secretary of State already has contact with local knowledge in the area of salmon fishing because he has a statutory contact with the district fishery boards and salmon fishery boards, which are under a statutory obligation to report to him on all matters affecting salmon within their district. It is clear that he would be just as well advised to have a similar contact with a body that has charge of the interests of trout fishing within the same area. Area Boards, therefore, would be an admirable way of keeping the Secretary of State in touch with local problems and giving him the benefit of local know-how.

My Lords, I welcome this Bill. I want to sec it succeed in its objectives. But I think it will have difficulty in doing so without the help of a proper machinery to administer it. It cannot be administered solely from St. Andrew's House, nor is it desirable that St. Andrew's House should attempt the task. All my experience suggests to me that Area Boards can provide the right machinery. Accordingly, I hope that during the passage of this Bill through your Lordships' House we shall be able to amend it to include Area Boards and thereby greatly improve its structure and its chances of real success.