The Fisheries Bill receives Royal Assent after 10 months in Parliament. The UK’s first major domestic fisheries legislation in nearly 40 years passed into law. The Fisheries Act 2020 gives the UK full control of its fishing waters for the first time since 1973.

The Fisheries Act will enable the UK to control who fishes in our waters through a new foreign vessel licencing regime and ends the current automatic rights for EU vessels to fish in UK waters.

Underpinning everything in the Act is a commitment to sustainability, ensuring healthy seas for future generations of fishermen. The UK Government and Devolved Administrations will now develop new fisheries management plans for managing fisheries to benefit the fishing industry and the marine environment.

Healthy fish stocks, with the prospect of further fishing opportunities delivered through international negotiations, will help drive economic growth for coastal communities around the country by making sure the industry can continue to thrive for years to come.

The Act now places the UK on a firm legal footing as the Transition Period ends, with the ability to put in place and enforce new rules to protect our offshore marine protected areas – boosting the government’s Blue Belt of marine protection around England’s coast.

Environment Secretary George Eustice said:

This is a huge moment for the UK fishing industry. This is the first domestic fisheries legislation in nearly 40 years, and we will now take back control of our waters out to 200 nautical miles or the median line.

The Fisheries Act makes clear our intention to continue to operate on the world stage as a leading, responsible, independent coastal State. We will protect our precious marine environment, whilst ensuring a fairer share of fishing opportunities for UK fishermen.

Click here to read more about this and link to the new Act 

Despite new government powers to recover the oceans, still nothing is guaranteed

Posted on 23 November, 2020 by Green Alliance blog

This post is by Helen McLachlan, WWF-UK’s fisheries programme manager and chair of Greener UK’s work on fisheries. As the Fisheries Act receives Royal Assent, it is important to reflect where we have got to, four years after the Brexit referendum. From the outset of the legislative process, Greener UK urged the UK and devolved governments to take this once in a generation opportunity to establish the UK as world leaders in sustainable fisheries management.

We set out the key elements that would be vital to achieve this. Critical was the need for fisheries management to be holistic, i.e. managed as an integral part of a healthy ocean ecosystem, no longer siloed off from other marine decision making. Also important was the setting of sustainable catches, based on the best science to restore fish stocks and maintain them at healthy levels. Accountability, in the form of remote electronic monitoring with cameras (REM) on vessels, was another feature that we argued should underpin sustainable management.

What the act does and doesn’t do
Today the Fisheries Act officially becomes law. In summary, it falls short of being world-leading or guaranteeing ocean recovery. It does not, for example, contain, as the government promised, a legal requirement for all fish stocks to be fished at sustainable levels.

However, some improvements were secured. The new act includes an objective to use an ecosystem-based approach to ensure that negative impacts on marine ecosystems are minimised and, where possible, reversed. This is important given the degraded nature of many marine habitats and species. There are also other very positive elements, such as mechanisms to recover stocks and the setting of a climate change objective. We were particularly pleased that this looks at not just adapting to, but also minimising, any climate adverse impacts fisheries may have. This could be a world first and we hope that the UK and devolved administrations can develop a climate change strategy for fisheries that can help to meet government net zero targets.’  Click here to read more