Seòmar agus comataidhean

What is in place to ensure that committee members—should it be us—are not back here in two years, hearing requests for more time?

That would be great.

I have asked about the effective monitoring of the fisheries management plans and the inclusion of the eight objectives. I am interested to understand a bit more about how you will approach that to make sure that those objectives are really clear to the people who will be working in those particular fisheries.

I will ask a bit more about the plans. It was great to hear Jane’s descriptions of how you are trying to figure out what the plans should be like.

Stakeholders have raised concerns regarding the approach of a single species per plan, as opposed to regional and area-based plans. As you are thinking through those issues, is there an opportunity to make a shift as you start to see that an area-based plan might be more appropriate?

The joint fisheries statement and the plans have come out of the Fisheries Act 2020, the first page of which lists the eight objectives, which include ecosystems and good environmental status for the sea bed. Will the fisheries management plans include indicators that will monitor progress and give the different Administrations an understanding of when something needs to change?

When we are working in committee on the marine space, one of the things that strikes me is the sense that fishermen who are out at sea are not necessarily cognisant of plans that are being imposed on how they have to change their practices. What are you going to put in place to ensure that fishers are aware of the fisheries management plans and the changes that they might have to make to their practices?

It would certainly seem that an area-based regional approach might fit better with the ecosystems-based approach that we are now being asked to consider through the objectives under the Fisheries Act 2020.

Cabinet secretary, you have mentioned the FMAC a number of times. I am interested in your role in that. We have heard from stakeholders that it is not necessarily a satisfactory forum and is a bit frustrating, and that people’s concerns are not necessarily being heard. Additionally, in a recent discussion about the regional inshore fisheries groups, a concern was raised that, although some groups are working well, for others, the last update of minutes of meetings was in 2022. You talk about the fora for engagement, but how well are they actually working?

That sounds reassuring. Over the past few years, we have been doing work through which it has become really clear that fishers are not aware of the Fisheries Act 2020, the Marine (Scotland) Act 2010 and all of the regulations. I also get a sense that stakeholders are not really clear that Scotland and the UK have signed up to a commitment to protect and restore 30 per cent of Scotland’s land and seas by 2030. That really needs to filter down. We see that issue in relation to the national planning framework as well, where we make high-level decisions that do not seem to get through on a more local level.

That is why I am touching on the idea of CPD and that kind of approach, so that we can really take people with us. In order to have a licence or a quota, for example, people would have to do some training to understand the shifting seascape that we are now working in.

We have just worked together on the Agriculture and Rural Communities (Scotland) Bill, which is now an act—hooray! Continuing professional development is an aspect of the act, and I wonder what your thoughts are on bringing in CPD for this, so that, to get a licence, fishermen need to do professional development work in order to move along with what will potentially be big changes in their sector.

It is interesting to hear that UK fisheries are some of the most regulated in the world. However, it is one thing to have regulation; enforcing and monitoring that is something else. I want to name that.

You are working on 21 plans in Scotland, out of—what is it?—29 plans, or something like that, in total. Scotland is responsible for a very large part of UK waters. Is there something in the mix around budget allocation for the work that needs to be done in Scotland, given that more fisheries management plans need to be developed? Is the right amount of resource being allocated, or is that part of the issue behind the delay, in that there are not enough people in the marine directorate who are able to put their attention to the work?