Fishing in turmoil as taxman ‘loses’ 97% of salmon exports

THE extent of the problems for fishing firms post-brexit may have been wildly exaggerated after it emerged the UK Government “lost” 97 per cent of Scottish salmon exports.

A fishing industry representative told MPS at the Scottish Affairs Committee about concerns with the data being shown by HMRC on the level of exports of Scottish salmon to the EU in January.

Hamish Macdonell, of the Scottish Salmon Producers Organisation (SSPO), said that the HMRC figures were off by 97%, and claimed it would be impossible to understand the extent of the problems the industry has faced as a result of Brexit without accurate data.

For January, HMRC has recorded 86 tonnes of Scottish salmon going to the EU. However, the SSPO said the true number was about 5,000 tonnes.

He added that the sector may have actually had a more successful January post-brexit than in 2020. However, due to the inaccurate figures, it was hard to quantify.

Mr Macdonell explained: “There is a real issue over the validity of the export stats which have been put out by HMRC. The figures for January are not just wrong, they are very, very wrong.

“It is very difficult for you as the committee, and for anybody else, to assess the impact of Brexit, when we don’t have a proper baseline of stats. This [HMRC data] is only 3% of the amount that actually went there.

“That has been the big problem, the very least in January in terms of the collation of the figures.

“Something happened to do with the way the figures were collected and I don’t know who is to blame or where the problem has come from, but unless we can get a really proper baseline of how much fish is actually going into Europe, it’s impossible to tell what the impact of Brexit [has been].”

Mr Macdonell added: “We believe we actually sent more salmon to Europe in January 2021 than we did in January 2020.

“If that is the case, that does tend to change the perspective quite a lot.”

The SSPO official was answering a question from Moray MP Douglas Ross, who said that the evidence was “incredible”.

Mr Ross replied: “That’s just an incredible statement that we’ve had from you.

“So you’re effectively saying that somehow HMRC have lost 97% of the salmon that was exported to the European Union?

“I’m not saying there’s salmon lying somewhere, but the figures collating that ... and it’s not just a couple of per cent. It’s the vast majority.”

Mr Macdonell said: “If you as a committee really want to understand what’s going on with Brexit, we need to get those figures right.

“The February figures were much more as we would expect, but we don’t know whether those figures include some from January which have been pushed on, or whether they are the actual February figures and it was just a blip that happened in January.

“Until we know for sure what’s happened it’s difficult to make any judgments.”

He also suggested that exports of Scottish salmon this January may have been higher than before Brexit, but due to the errors with the data, it was impossible to say accurately.

He added: “We believe that we actually sent more salmon to Europe in January 2021 than we did in January 2020.

“If that is the case, that does tend to change the perspective quite a lot.

An HMRC spokesman said: “We are aware of the Scottish Salmon Producers’ query on ‘whole, fresh/ chilled Atlantic Salmon’ exports.

“We carry out monthly quality assurance of the provisional trade data and revisions are made should we identify errors.”

The figures for January are not just wrong, they are very, very wrong