This group contains amendments to schedule 18, which makes provision for repealing legislation that is no longer of practical use. Before I outline the amendments, may I say how much I welcome re-encountering the hon. Members for Chesterfield (Toby Perkins) and for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah), whose very...

This group contains amendments to schedule 18, which makes provision for repealing legislation that is no longer of practical use. Before I outline the amendments, may I say how much I welcome re-encountering the hon. Members for Chesterfield (Toby Perkins) and for Newcastle upon Tyne Central (Chi Onwurah), whose very...

The UK Government are today launching a package of public consultations concerning the implementation of reforms to the common fisheries policy (CFP).

As part of the reform of the CFP, a new basic regulation and common market organisation of fishery and aquaculture products (CMO) entered into force on 1 January 2014....

The UK Government are today launching a package of public consultations concerning the implementation of reforms to the common fisheries policy (CFP).

As part of the reform of the CFP, a new basic regulation and common market organisation of fishery and aquaculture products (CMO) entered into force on 1 January 2014....

My Hon Friend the Parliamentary Under- Secretary of State (George Eustice) has today made the following statement.

The UK Government is today launching a package of public consultations concerning the implementation of reforms to the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP).

As part of the reform of the CFP, a new basic regulation...

My Hon Friend the Parliamentary Under- Secretary of State (George Eustice) has today made the following statement.

The UK Government is today launching a package of public consultations concerning the implementation of reforms to the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP).

As part of the reform of the CFP, a new basic regulation...

My Hon Friend the Parliamentary Under- Secretary of State (George Eustice) has today made the following statement.

I represented the UK at the EU Agriculture Council on 17 February. Scottish Minister, Richard Lochhead, and Welsh Minister, Alun Davies, were also present.

Promotion of EU Agricultural Products

The Commission presented the main...

My Hon Friend the Parliamentary Under- Secretary of State (George Eustice) has today made the following statement.

I represented the UK at the EU Agriculture Council on 17 February. Scottish Minister, Richard Lochhead, and Welsh Minister, Alun Davies, were also present.

Promotion of EU Agricultural Products

The Commission presented the main...

I represented the UK at the EU Agriculture Council on 17 February. Scottish Minister, Richard Lochhead, and Welsh Minister, Alun Davies, were also present.

Promotion of EU agricultural products

The Commission presented the main aspects of the new proposal: a focus on third country markets; ending national co-financing to ensure a...

I represented the UK at the EU Agriculture Council on 17 February. Scottish Minister, Richard Lochhead, and Welsh Minister, Alun Davies, were also present.

Promotion of EU agricultural products

The Commission presented the main aspects of the new proposal: a focus on third country markets; ending national co-financing to ensure a...

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the fishing industry.

I welcome the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the hon. Member for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice), the new fisheries Minister, to his first annual fisheries debate. There was a time when these debates were fairly...

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the fishing industry.

I welcome the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, the hon. Member for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice), the new fisheries Minister, to his first annual fisheries debate. There was a time when these debates were fairly...

The hon. Gentleman mentioned discards. I know of a boat on the west coast of Scotland that in September and October sadly dumped about 400 boxes of spurdog,

because there was no quota to land that species. I asked the previous Minister, the hon. Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon), what...

The hon. Gentleman mentioned discards. I know of a boat on the west coast of Scotland that in September and October sadly dumped about 400 boxes of spurdog,

because there was no quota to land that species. I asked the previous Minister, the hon. Member for Newbury (Richard Benyon), what...

The hon. Gentleman makes a valid point. All of us are ashamed of the level of discards, but at the end of the day, that has been part—

The hon. Gentleman makes a valid point. All of us are ashamed of the level of discards, but at the end of the day, that has been part—

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Of course.

Of course.

Mr Deputy Speaker is frowning at me, but I will try to be brief. Does not the hon. Gentleman think that over the years the problem of discards has been seen as far too difficult to deal with, but that we must now get stuck into finding a method of...

Mr Deputy Speaker is frowning at me, but I will try to be brief. Does not the hon. Gentleman think that over the years the problem of discards has been seen as far too difficult to deal with, but that we must now get stuck into finding a method of...

I agree with the hon. Gentleman entirely. I had not quite finished my sentence, but we are all opposed to discards: it is criminal to throw good fish back into the sea. We have a major problem in this country in that the majority of our fisheries are mixed ones,...

I agree with the hon. Gentleman entirely. I had not quite finished my sentence, but we are all opposed to discards: it is criminal to throw good fish back into the sea. We have a major problem in this country in that the majority of our fisheries are mixed ones,...

I congratulate the hon. Member for Aberdeen North (Mr Doran) and others on securing this timely debate. I thank the Backbench Business Committee for allowing the debate to take place in the Chamber so that there can be more contributions than there have been to such debates in Westminster Hall.

I...

I congratulate the hon. Member for Aberdeen North (Mr Doran) and others on securing this timely debate. I thank the Backbench Business Committee for allowing the debate to take place in the Chamber so that there can be more contributions than there have been to such debates in Westminster Hall.

I...

Does my hon. Friend agree that although it is great that the European system is now grinding into place to ban discards—I wish the Minister well in that—the process must be kept going and indeed sped up? My knowledge of the EU, and I suspect that of my hon. Friend,...

Does my hon. Friend agree that although it is great that the European system is now grinding into place to ban discards—I wish the Minister well in that—the process must be kept going and indeed sped up? My knowledge of the EU, and I suspect that of my hon. Friend,...

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, and I agree with him. The opinion of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee on this deal was published in February 2012 and the Government response in July 2012. It has taken three years of difficult negotiations, and I commend the fisheries...

I am grateful to my hon. Friend, and I agree with him. The opinion of the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee on this deal was published in February 2012 and the Government response in July 2012. It has taken three years of difficult negotiations, and I commend the fisheries...

The hon. Lady calls for us to be imaginative in dealing with some of the problems that fisheries throw up. Twenty years ago I fished for spurdog as a targeted fish, but things have moved on and, as I said earlier, it is now a non-targeted fish often caught in...

The hon. Lady calls for us to be imaginative in dealing with some of the problems that fisheries throw up. Twenty years ago I fished for spurdog as a targeted fish, but things have moved on and, as I said earlier, it is now a non-targeted fish often caught in...

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will join me in tasting some of that to see whether it is edible, and we could look at creating a new market.

As the hon. Member for Aberdeen North said, the key points of the next stage of reform include a ban on the wasteful practice...

Perhaps the hon. Gentleman will join me in tasting some of that to see whether it is edible, and we could look at creating a new market.

As the hon. Member for Aberdeen North said, the key points of the next stage of reform include a ban on the wasteful practice...

My hon. Friend is making a superb speech. She mentioned two key elements to reform, but does she agree that there is a third? History might reveal that that third element—a legal requirement to fish sustainably, to fish to maximum sustainable yield—is even more of a game changer. Is that...

My hon. Friend is making a superb speech. She mentioned two key elements to reform, but does she agree that there is a third? History might reveal that that third element—a legal requirement to fish sustainably, to fish to maximum sustainable yield—is even more of a game changer. Is that...

I am grateful for that intervention, and it gives me the opportunity to record my thanks to my hon. Friend for the hours he spent on the groundwork to achieve a historic agreement. Sustainability is key, and sustainability will be proved by following the science. We went too far away...

I am grateful for that intervention, and it gives me the opportunity to record my thanks to my hon. Friend for the hours he spent on the groundwork to achieve a historic agreement. Sustainability is key, and sustainability will be proved by following the science. We went too far away...

Does the hon. Lady agree that the idea of regionalisation, as described by the EU, is perhaps one of the tremendous ways that the EU misleads us? The first meeting on the regionalisation of the north-west waters took place in Dublin on 12 November. The group includes the UK, Ireland,...

Does the hon. Lady agree that the idea of regionalisation, as described by the EU, is perhaps one of the tremendous ways that the EU misleads us? The first meeting on the regionalisation of the north-west waters took place in Dublin on 12 November. The group includes the UK, Ireland,...