§ Sir Cranley OnslowTo ask the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food what action she is taking to ensure that Danish sand eel fishing operations off the east coast of Britain do not jeopardise stocks of sea fish and bird life; and if she will make a statement.
§ Mr. JackDenmark has the major interest in industrial fishing in the North sea, but does not have access to fisheries which lie within the British 12-mile limit, nor to the sand eel fishery south of the Shetlands which has been closed for the last three years.
There is at present no conclusive evidence that current levels of industrial fishing are having an adverse effect on fish stocks. A study group of the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea on sea bird-fish interactions last year indicated that there was unlikely to be much competition between sea birds and the sand-eel fishery. Nonetheless, I believe that the implications of industrial fishing should be considered in depth and, following pressure from the United Kingdom, the December Fisheries Council agreed to the establishment of a working group, composed of marine ecologists and fisheries 281W biologists, to study the implications for the marine ecosystem of fishing in general and industrial fishing in particular. The group will set priorities for future research work on the effect these have on the marine ecosystem, sea birds and small cetaceans.