EU boats to fish off UK but ‘under our control’

EUROPEAN fishermen will still be allowed access to Britain’s waters after we leave the EU – but only on the UK’s terms, Brexit Secretary David Davis said yesterday.

The Common Fisheries Policy, which leaves British fishermen catching less than 40 per cent of the fish in UK coastal waters, will continue under the transition deal negotiated with the EU.

Tory rebels led by Jacob ReesMogg have branded the deal – which will continue EU rules and quotas until at least the end of 2020 – a ‘betrayal’ of fishermen.

But on the BBC’s Andrew Marr Show yesterday, Mr Davis said: ‘Let’s be clear about what’s been agreed first, because there’s been a lot of headlines which have not necessarily represented it.

‘Firstly, fishing year 2019 will be agreed under the current arrangements, 2020 we have got a guarantee of no reduction of our quota share and consultation.

‘Beyond that, we are going to be an independent coastal state making our own negotiations with our neighbours, as every other coastal state does, and it will be under our control. That is the termination, that is what we are going to do.’

Asked if he would still put up with continuing EU access to British waters after Brexit, he said: ‘We will negotiate with surrounding states so that we have access to their waters and they to ours, markets and so on, but it will be under our control.’

Meanwhile, SNP Rural Economy Secretary Fergus Ewing said there needs to be a guarantee from the UK Government that it will ‘not trade away’ access to Scotland’s waters.

He told the BBC’s Sunday Politics Scotland programme that the SNP wants Scotland and the UK to remain in the EU but come out of the Common Fisheries Policy, even though the EU stipulates that all members must sign up to it.

Host Gordon Brewer responded: ‘You can’t be in the European Union without being in the CFP, so to say you’ve always opposed it is a bit like saying you are in favour of cars but you’ve always been opposed to steering wheels.’

Mr Ewing replied: ‘Well, that’s a fancy metaphor but I don’t think it is applicable because our record is very clear that we have always opposed the CFP, we believe that it is dysfunctional.’

Last week, it was announced that Britain will soon take delivery of state-of-the-art gunboats to protect its fishing waters from the EU and others after Brexit.

HMS Forth is the first of five from the Batch 2 River-class Offshore Patrol Vessels production line, built by BAE systems in Scotland.