EUROPEAN plans to cut North Sea quotas of species such as haddock and whiting will actually increase the amount of fish discarded at sea, fishermen have warned.
Talks between the EU and Norway are due to get under way on the issue on Monday but the Shetland Fishermen's Association said that existing quotas were already "inadequate" in an area in which fish stocks were abundant.
Simon Collins, executive officer of the association, said: "No one wants to see perfectly healthy, high-quality fish dumped back into the sea, dead. But in accordance with multi-annual plans devised before the discard ban materialised, the European Commission is proposing cuts in already inadequate quotas.
"Not for the first time, quotas are simply failing to catch up with what is happening on our fishing grounds. And the result is discarding for purely regulatory reasons.
"It is bitterly ironic to hear the commission arguing for quota cuts that would necessarily lead to more discards. Is it serious about tackling discards or not?"
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article