Legislation Cannot Secure Safeguard – Fishupdate.com

Legislation Cannot Secure Safeguard Fishing Monthly Published:  03 October, 2002

A FISHERMEN’S grouping today claimed the Scottish Fishermen’s Federation is wrong in its belief that relative stability can be secured for the UK if it is written into legislation now.

The Fishermen’s Association said the implication of the SFF aim is that this move would ensure that Scottish fishermen will always receive their share of fishing entitlements in our seas.

But regrettably the seas around the UK are not “our seas” but part of the EU fisheries common pond.

Since FAL was established in 1995, it had tried to ensure that there is a proper understanding of the difference between the real Common Fisheries Policy and the Relative Stability principle but despite that there has been a failure to grasp the position.

And relative stability is a fundamental principle of the derogation from the full effects of the Common Fisheries Policy, not of the Common Fisheries Policy, otherwise it would be written into the Treaty, the association added.

“Being part of the derogation, it is an exception to, and therefore incompatible with, the non-discrimination principle of the Treaty of Rome, and since European law stipulates that no exceptions can be allowed, other than those agreed upon for a transitional period, it will therefore terminate on or before the expiry date of the derogation, which is 31 December 2002.”

And twenty years of relative stability, a temporary derogation to the real CFP of equal access to the common resource, does not mean that UK fishermen have historic rights, the association contended.