Marine and Coastal Access Bill [HL]

The trouble with giving way to other noble Lords is that nearly everything you want to say has been said, but I think it needs reinforcing. This is crucial for all of us around the Chamber. We do not want to put into statute something that affects British trawlermen but does not have the same effect on others who come fishing within our area. This issue has already exercised the Committee. The comments made by the noble Lord, Lord Eden, about discards and trawling—and I would include sand eels—reminded me of all the reports we have had from the EU Committee looking at fishing and the CAP. Year after year we say that we all know where there is a problem and what ought to be done, but nothing gets done. This is a very good amendment, as other noble Lords have said, because it highlights some of the practical problems of bringing in legislation specifically for your own country rather than it being common to everybody. How do you police it? We are back to square one. The noble Lord, Lord Greenway, mentioned the question of how you mark these areas, because people do not always do this deliberately. Doing it by default is bad enough but doing it deliberately is hugely damaging. I understand that there are historic rights. Can the Minister clarify what those are? If we have no-take zones, they should be no-take zones for everybody. There does not seem to be, if I am reading it right, as much of a problem within the six-mile limit; the limits beyond that cause the greatest problem. I go back to a point made earlier. Another noble Lord—I cannot remember who it was—asked whether it is just the easy no-take zones nearer the shore that will be allocated, and how that will relate to the sustainability of fish that might well be beyond that limit. If you had to implement that policy then it would be much easier to do the simpler things first, but in the long term that might not help conservation. The amendment that my noble friend has moved has invigorated the Committee to bring back real and practical issues for the Government to think about, and in my few words I wanted to reinforce many of the issues that have been raised. We need to have a satisfactory answer. We may not be able to get an answer on the EU question from the Minister, but if he is not able to give it to us today then by Report we certainly need something concrete in that regard.