It was like sailing on a liquid goldmine. During the boom days of the Eighties, many skippers and crews made a fortune every year harvesting the riches of the ocean. But the wealth has now all but disappeared, and a new generation is facing the fact that the search for riches will have to be made elsewhere - if at all. Already, generations born and bred for the sea seek other futures. It is a trend that worries the figureheads of the industry - the skippers - almost as much as the new restrictions. Shortages of crews are looming ever larger. Many have left altogether for jobs in the oil industry. Now, for 10 weeks from February 14, the Scottish and Norwegian fleets will not be able to enter recognised cod spawning grounds, hopefully allowing stocks to recover. The Scottish Fishermens' Federation wants the taxpayer to stump up £100m to aid the decommissioning of about 100 vessels. With more boats out of the industry, there will be more fish left for the rest, the theory runs. If stocks recover... Scotland's fishing industry stands on the brink of a crisis unlike anything it has seen in living memory. Although the perilous state of cod stocks had been known for at least a year, the Scottish Executive has completely failed to take the lead and pre-empt the plans, put forward by EU Fisheries Commissioner Franz Fischler, that will be disastrous to Scottish interests. It is particularly galling that Scotland, with the only fishing fleet to adopt conservation measures, should pay the biggest penalty. The Commission's proposals for large cod control zones would only compound this situation. They are also regarded as ineffective as a cod conservation measure in any event. Whether over-fishing, pollution or global warming is to blame is now largely irrelevant because no one really knows if even conservation measures on this scale are simply too late. The figures tell their own story. Between 1971 and 1999, stocks of spawning cod fell from 277,000 tonnes to 67,000 tonnes. Last year, they were down to 59,000 tonnes. Catch quotas have been set at around half that level. So dramatic has the fall been that fishermen have not been able to even land that amount. If the commission proposal becomes a regulation, it is estimated that around 500 Scottish vessels - around half the Scottish fleet - are likely to be unable to continue fishing. The SNP has claimed that countries such as Ireland give 10 times more aid to its fishing industry than does the UK, while Portugal and Spain six times as much, Denmark five times and Sweden twice as much as the UK. The figures from the Scottish Parliament library were published by former SNP leader Alex Salmond, the Banff and Buchan MP, and reveal the UK trails ninth in a league table of support for the fishing industry. But the Scottish Executive said that the figures were neither dramatic nor new. Speaking at a press conference in Inverness as vital talks on a cod recovery plan in Brussels continued, Mr Salmond insisted tens of millions of pounds are required to help save the Scottish fishing industry. He said the best way forward would be to implement a six-month compensated lay-up scheme, in which boats would be given an alternative of going to sea and over-fishing fragile stocks, such as prawn. And he blamed the UK Government for failing to adequately support the Scots fishing fleet. SNP fisheries spokesman Richard Lochhead has called on the Executive to provide more money for new investment in the industry. He called current funding levels of 1% of the rural development budget "absolutely pathetic". "As far as New Labour are concerned if you are a car worker the Government is prepared to write a blank cheque to protect your jobs, but if you are a fisherman willing to risk your life you simply don't count," said Mr Lochhead. But in a written parliamentary answer to SNP fisheries spokesman Richard Lochhead, Scottish Executive First Minister Henry McLeish has side-stepped the question of whether a London-based negotiating team agreed to a cod recovery plan that threatens to devastate the Scottish fishing industry. Mr Lochhead asked Mr McLeish in a written question, to confirm to both his cabinet and to MSPs whether minutes from a meeting on the issue in Brussels, which suggested UK acceptance of the cod plan, were accurate. But Mr McLeish has not answered this point specifically but instead has underlined the importance of the fishing industry to Scotland. The usual weasel words will not, in this case, suffice. Return to Articles Index |
