Many years ago I worked for a politician on the european parliament’s fishing committee. He was steering through the Parliament’s report on a piece of EU legislation on fishing net seizes. I learnt a lot. When the law was adopted I remember being told by the civil servant who wrote the law that ‘it will never work, fishermen will find ways around it’. He was right, and the law did not work, and fish stocks continued to collapse.
I also learnt that most politicians sitting on thr fishing committee are there to serve one interest and it is not the fish. Most politicians sitting on the fishing committee are there to serve fishermen and what fishermen want. They have done a disatrous job. As the number of fish in the sea have plummeted the number of jobs have collapsed. The politicians and fishermen look for other forces of nature to blame and forget to look in the mirror of self interest.
So, I was happy to see a unique group of MEPs who want the new Common Fisheries Policy actually be about putting fish first. Fish the Future are a remarkable group of politicians – they actually want to put fish at the centre of Europe’s fisheries policy – and I hope they win.