High fuel prices may hand Scots catch quotas to foreign skippers

Published on Sunday 11 May 2008 20:46

THE soaring cost of marine fuel could lead to Scottish skippers being forced to surrender key fishing quotas and catching opportunities to foreign fishing fleets, fishermen's leaders warned today.

A number of skippers are already being forced to remain in harbour rather than put to sea because record high fuel prices are making fishing trips financially unviable.

There are now mounting concerns that by the end of the year Scottish boats will have failed to have fully taken their share of the catch quotas from Europe, resulting in the future reallocation of quotas by the EU to "subsidised" foreign fleets.

That is the stark warning which will be delivered today at a summit meeting in Aberdeen between leaders of the Scottish Fishermen's Federation (SFF) and Richard Lochhead, the rural affairs secretary.

And The Scotsman exclusively revealed last month that changes being proposed for European fisheries regulations could allow an "armada" of Spanish trawlers to finally gain access to Scotland's rich traditional fishing grounds by giving the European Commission the power to reallocate unused national fishing quotas.

Bertie Armstrong, the chief executive of the SFF, said:

"If we fail to take our share because boats can't afford to put to sea or are put out of business, someone else will take our fish."