§ Mr. Austin Mitchellasked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food whether he has received any representations for financial aid for the storage of fish to ensure continuity of supplies to the fish processing industry; and whether he has any proposals to make such aid available.
§ Mr. Buchanan-SmithMy right hon. Friend has received one recent request 37W from a fish processing company for aid to meet the cost of storing fish. We have no proposals to make financial aid available to the processing industry for this purpose.
§ Mr. Austin Mitchellasked the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food whether aid can be made available under his recent provision of £2 million temporary aid to the fishing industry for storage of fish or for the fish processing industry.
§ Mr. Buchanan-SmithThe purpose of the fish producers' organisation scheme 1980 is to provide assistance for the fishing industry through fish producer organisations. It does not provide for direct assistance to the fish processing industry. How producer organisations use the money available to them is a matter for their judgment within a range of options which the scheme offers. These do not specifically include the financing of the placing of fish into store for the benefit of their members, but should any producer organisation wish to propose such a course we would consider the suggestion sympathetically.