Seòmar agus comataidhean

The Scottish Government is committed to tackling the wasteful practice of discarding and we have set out our proposals to address this issue in our Future Catching Policy (FCP) consultation, which ran from 15 March to 7 June. The Future Catching Policy has co-management at the heart of its approach, recognising that we need to work in partnership to develop robust and workable practices to reduce unwanted catch of fish and bycatch of other marine species. This will help to reduce discarding as far as possible whilst allowing for limited discarding in certain circumstances under permitted exemptions. We do not have a target for the reduction in discards, rather we are focussed on eliminating illegal discarding, and ensuring that any discarding which does take place under permitted exemptions is properly recorded and accounted for to enable sustainable fishing activity to take place. This is in keeping with the current approach under the current EU/UK landing obligation.

A key component of the proposed FCP is to put in place additional technical (e.g. gear selectivity) and spatial (e.g. area closures to protect spawning fish) measures, designed to reduce unwanted catch further where required.The fishing industry is already heavily regulated, with many rules in place already designed to limit unwanted catch (for example, the use of square mesh panels in fishing nets in the west of Scotland Nephrops fishery, or the spatial measures within the North Sea Cod Avoidance Plan). There is scope to increase these measures through the FCP in a proportionate way.

We will be analysing responses to the consultation prior to confirming firm proposals later this year.

As set out in the answer to S6W-08824 on 8 June 2022, vessels are obliged to record both fish that has been discarded under a permitted exemption and fish below MCRS that is landed. We do not, however, have a separate electronic system in place which allows for recording specific discards under exemption rules separate to other discards (e.g. those which might occur for non-quota stocks not subject to the landing obligation or fish discarded because of force majeure). This is because the electronic system in use on vessels pre-dates the landing obligation.

The information provided below has been recorded and submitted to us by vessels and relates to species which are below the Minimum Conservation Reference Size (MCRS) and which are subject to the landing obligation because they are quota species.

We are unable to provide a species breakdown as some species were only reported by one vessel and may be disclosive.

Total discards recorded of quota fish below minimum size caught in ICES areas 4 and 6a in 2021 for all species, Scottish vessels landing anywhere.

Following agreement with COSLA, a total funding allocation of £8 million across local authorities on a per-pupil basis for the academic year 2022 has been agreed to continue funding free instrumental music tuition in schools.

An additional allocation of around £3 million was provided for those authorities which had budgeted for instrumental music tuition fee income.

Further consultation is ongoing to develop a sustainable funding model.

We have contacted the UK Government Insolvency Service's Redundancy Payments Service regarding the workers who were made redundant at Dawnfresh Seafoods plant in Uddingston.

The Redundancy Payments Service has advised that 200 claims from Dawnfresh employees were received and that all payable redundancy, arrears of wages and holiday pay claims have been paid within the statutory limits, except for one outstanding redundancy pay claim.

The delivery of the Islands Bond is still being carefully considered in light of the strong feedback we have received from island residents, and within the new context of the current energy crisis and rising living costs which are being experienced by many islanders.

I refer the member to the answer to question S6W-08761 on
‎ 8 June 2022. All answers to written Parliamentary Questions are available on the Parliament's website, the search facility for which can be found at https://www.parliament.scot/chamber-and-committees/written-questions-and-answers

There were no substantive changes made to the draft of the Temporary Measures Agreement (TMA) shared with Serco Caledonian Sleepers Limited (‘Serco’) on 25 February 2022.

The changes amounted to the correction of one typographical error, and the inclusion of a minor drafting clarification.

Following an open tender process in January, we have contracted a consortium of expert researchers to help inform our thinking on Scotland’s future peace offer. This will enable us to consider next steps in establishing the Peace Institute. The researchers will report back to us in the Summer.

There is a range of activity necessary to allow for implementation of the provisions contained in the Domestic Abuse (Protection) (Scotland) Act 2021. This includes development of civil court rules, new processes developed for ensuring the views of children are able to be received by the court in given cases, appropriate funding is able to be identified and prioritised and justice agencies are ready for the introduction of the new protection notice and protection order powers. The provisions not yet in force will be brought into force in due course.

No applications have been received to date because the Islands Bond has not been launched.