Some of the members of the European Parliament’s fisheries committee acknowledged on Wednesday 20 June that reaching agreement on the revision of the fisheries control system before the end of the current term of office will be difficult. They repeated their opposition to the requirement to have on-board cameras fitted in order to monitor compliance with the ban on the discarding of fish.
EU fisheries ministers have also been critical of the text (see EUROPE 12043).
Mission impossible? Rapporteur on revision of the control regulation, Isabelle Thomas (S&D, France) commended the work done by the European Commission, even though the timing was not ideal. “We’ll try to get it done in a year but it looks a bit like mission impossible”, she said. Among the positives in the proposal, she highlighted: - harmonisation of sanctions; - improving the information system; - the ending of certain derogations (imported products and monitoring throughout the whole production chain, including transport); - the use of new techniques, so long as they did not mean fresh expenditure.
She felt, however, that a lot of work would still have to be done to “improve” the proposed text. Above all, the regulation had to be understandable to fishermen, she said. The negatives in the proposal are: - focus on toughening sanctions (sanctions don’t need to be increased, just applied); - Parliament has already rejected having cameras on board vessels.
Thomas is not against extending the rules to vessels of under 12 metres but simple and not overly expensive tools have to be found. “The control regulation mustn’t become a sanctions regulation”, she made clear.
Liadh Ní Riada (GUE/NGL, Ireland) stressed that what had to be avoided was a two-tier system that worked to the detriment of small-scale fishermen.
Clara Eugenia Aguilera Garcia (S&D, Spain) highlighted the short, one year, timescale to have everything done and dusted and argued that more checks on leisure fishing were needed.
Francisco José Millan Mon (EPP, Spain) welcomed the efforts to harmonise sanctions. He also suggested that the new rules (extended to vessels under 12 metres) could bring about an increase in costs and red tape for member state vessels. He was very reluctant to allow on-board cameras and felt that the system proposed for monitoring the power of vessels went a bit too far.
Linnéa Engström (Greens/EFA, Sweden) said sanctions had to act as a deterrent and be proportionate. She also talked about EU standards on inspections at sea, catch data and leisure fishing, and the points system to be applied by all member states.
The Commission stated that the timescale scheduled for implementing the new rules was 24 months. (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)