The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, poses some serious challenges in his amendment. Indeed, quota allocation is already a highly complex and opaque feature in fishing. The tabling of Amendments 17 and 95 affords us a brief opportunity to probe the Government over how equal access will work in practice once the constituent parts of the UK have the freedom, at least theoretically, to determine their own quota allocations and wider regulatory frameworks.
In view of the earlier discussion today, I am sure the Minister will argue that these amendments are unwise as they undermine the work that the Government have already undertaken with the devolved Administrations in drafting the Bill. I also pre-empt his commitment that the various issues raised by the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, will come out in the mix once the Bill is in place and the various statements and management plans begin to appear. Be that as it may, I am sure that fishers in different parts of the UK will be interested to hear his comments on how all of this will work in practice.
For example, how will the Government and devolved Administrations work together to ensure that the regulations of each part of the UK are compatible, being both available and accessible to those who will have to rely on them? How will issues such as enforcement be managed to ensure that the devolution settlement is upheld, while also respecting the equal access objective, as it is currently drafted, when they could diverge over time? This topic arose during the Commons Committee stage on the previous Bill, so I hope that the reassurances offered tonight will meet all the Committee’s expectations. A significant amount of time has passed since those debates and we are only a short time away from potential problems ceasing to be purely hypothetical.
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