Compte rendu in extenso des débats

Jeudi 25 octobre 2012 - Strasbourg

14.3. Conservation et exploitation durable des ressources halieutiques (A7-0314/2012 - Ian Hudghton) (vote)

− Prima della votazione

  Ian Hudghton, rapporteur. − Mr President, this report is before us today because there is a significant delay being forecast with regard to reaching a conclusion on reform of the common fisheries policy. That is not surprising given that, with the Rodust report, MEPs have tabled some 2 600 amendments to the main regulation. My report was presented as something of a technicality, but there are some important messages to be carried forward from it.

The report was unanimously approved by the Committee on Fisheries, which is itself unusual. It relates to ensuring that the access regime out to 12 miles which is currently in place should be allowed to continue until such time as the new CFP has been agreed. If we did not approve this report, the 12-mile access regime would expire at the end of this year. I am glad to say that the committee unanimously agreed that this would be unacceptable and unthinkable.

The 12-mile zone has been a feature of the common fisheries policy since the initial regulation in 1983, and since then it has always been put into effect for a further ten-year period. This extension would continue until 2014, and then we will see what the new CFP brings.

But I want to make the point that even the Commission has accepted that the management of fisheries within the 12-mile zone has on the whole been successful: ‘generally managed successfully’, in the Commission’s words. So drawing lessons from that, which effectively means that the fishing nations themselves have been relatively successful in managing fisheries out to 12 miles, compared with the general failure of the common fisheries policy as a whole, I think that there is strong case for extending the 12-mile limit both in time and in distance. But that is an argument for the Rodust report, which I look forward to receiving.