191. Throughout this inquiry we have borne in mind the need for the UK sea fishing industry to compete in an increasingly global market. There is a romantic vision of a golden age when anyone was free to buy or borrow a boat, go out to sea, catch whatever he could and bring it back to the market. If that time ever existed, it has long gone. Fishermen today are guided by the regulations imposed to preserve the resources of the sea and also increasingly by the requirements of the market. We have seen a change from the fisherman as hunter to the fisherman as harvester, in the words of one witness, and from an industry driven by supply to one shaped by demand. There will always be small niche markets for individual fishermen, perhaps serving local customers, the tourist trade or specialists after high value, luxury products. However, the mass market in the future as in all other industries will be serviced mainly by large scale producers. This is an opportunity as much as a threat to the industry today. It does not mean that the small vessel owners must inevitably bow to huge conglomerates with no attachments to regional interests. Instead, with imagination and drive, local communities can form their own cooperatives or strengthen existing ones as the POs are already doing and perhaps also move into adding value to their products. Moving further up the chain, the processors have a key role in assisting the catching sector to take on the challenges set by the fish-buyers for both the retail and catering trade. This task will be easier if they continue to talk to the customers and if the industry recognises the need to work together towards common goals. From our meetings around the country, we know that the entrepreneurial flair and dedication are there to transform the competitiveness of the UK sea fishing industry.

192. We have been struck by the difficulties in attracting young people into the industry. We were told that local education authorities in one area would no longer acknowledge "fishing as a career, at all", and in another part of the country that it had proved impossible to recruit candidates when a course had been organised.[738] The great exception to this was in Shetland. There we visited the North Atlantic Fisheries College which combines community courses with skippers' certificates and PhDs. The College was in the process of expansion and it was clear that students were drawn to its courses not for the lack of an alternative to fishing but because of the training it offered and the positive image it created of fishing-related careers. We received a proposal for an initiative along similar lines to establish a National Institute for Fisheries based in Grimsby as the centrepiece of a national strategy on public fisheries education in the UK.[739] We commend such far-sighted ideas to the Government and urge MAFF to explore with the Department for Education and Employment the possibility of establishing a National Institute for Fisheries, on the basis set out in the Grimsby submission, to provide for the whole fishing industry a similar range of training, research, advisory and scientific study to that provided by the North Atlantic Fisheries College in Shetland and national institutions in other EU countries.

193. We have advocated the need for change throughout the industry. This applies equally to those in Government responsible for fisheries, whether in England, Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland. Devolution only serves to emphasise the obligation on the Government to devise and promulgate a clear, coherent strategy for the future of the fishing industry and its place within the UK economy. Although we encourage the industry to be self-regulating and self-reliant, we recognise that at the moment its activities are to a great extent dictated by regulations imposed by the Government either unilaterally or as a result of European decisions. The Government therefore has more control over the fishing industry than over any other we have examined and it is incumbent on Ministers to exercise this responsibility in a way that brings stability to the industry and is manifestly fair. This means establishing a regulatory framework in which the industry can operate confident that any proposals for change will be rigorously examined in order to understand their full impact on fishermen and the existing regulatory structure, and introduced only after consultation with the industry. The Government must also work with the industry to ensure parity of treatment with fishermen in other EU Member States, either by minimising any adverse effects on competition or by challenging discriminatory behaviour in other countries throughout the EC. At home, it must work with scientists, managers, inspectors, fishermen, processors and retailers to bring the different elements of the industry together. At the beginning of this Report, we set out the criteria against which to judge any management system. We now challenge the Government to set out its own objectives and plans for meeting them. We recommend that the Government establish for the first time a clear, agreed and coherent strategy for the management and development of the UK fishing industry which will unite all concerned in working towards greater efficiency and competitiveness. The process of change faced by the UK sea fishing industry is not finished. There will be new markets to provide fresh opportunities and also new rivals to its activities in the growth of aquaculture, for example. The Government must act constructively and strategically to enable the industry to realise its full potential.

739  Unprinted evidence from Mr Sidney Keene. Back