EXCLUSIVE: Rate Sir Keir on his fishing deal using our UKFC ‘Starmer Scoreboard’!

The international treaty on the seas says the fish are ours and the EU can have any leftovers, under our conditions

That’s the law and it’s very simple

The EU signed it, the UK signed it, 169 countries signed it – Why is international rights lawyer Sir Keir Starmer about to ignore it?

The UK Fisheries Campaign ‘Starmer Scoreboard’

Grade his fishing deal on a ‘scale’ of 1 to 10 and decide whether to throw it overboard

Tomorrow’s ‘EU Reset’ summit in London called by the Prime Minister will be an abomination on a great many levels but here we focus on just one of these. Ahead of the summit’s various conclusions and agreements, the UK Fisheries Campaign reveals :

• What tomorrow’s fishing deal should say, under international law
• How it would give our fishermen what they want and need in order to renew their industry
• How it would start to bring our neglected coastal communities back to life
• And how the United Kingdom would become a proud, sovereign, maritime nation once again

Readers will then be able to read what Sir Keir Starmer has surrendered to the EU and compare it to what is done by every other coastal state around the world. We use the word ‘surrender’ based on what has more or less already been agreed, according to our sources in Brussels.

The UK Fisheries Campaign ‘Starmer Scoreboard’

Here is your scoreboard to mark the Prime Minister out of 1 to 10. Following this we provide the summary from the international treaty this is based on.  Once you’ve awarded him his mark let us know how he did, in the comments section below this article!

Score out of 10:  How many ‘yesses’?

How we compiled the ‘Starmer Scoreboard’

The question of who owns what in the world’s seas is answered very simply. Go and look at the international treaty signed by almost every significant country in the world and you’ll find it all laid out.  It took years to detail everything, negotiate it, and get it agreed and signed. 

The legal framework for all marine and maritime activities worldwide is called UNCLOS (the ‘United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea’). It is an international treaty with came into force in 1994 and has 169 countries plus the EU signed up to it.

Who owns UK waters?

One of the subjects UNCLOS covers is the primacy of nations over the waters surrounding them. The UK’s territorial waters extend to 12 nautical miles from the coast, in which the UK has virtually complete control and UK laws apply. There is then a ‘contiguous zone’ of a further 12 nautical miles where vessels can be pursued for any infringement within the territorial waters. These two zones of 12 nautical miles are included in the Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) which extends out to 200 nautical miles from the coast, over which the UK has exclusive rights.

Article 56 states that in the 200 nautical mile EEZ the coastal State (the UK in this case) has:

“(a) sovereign rights for the purpose of exploring and exploiting, conserving and managing the natural resources, whether living or non-living, of the waters superjacent to the seabed and of the seabed and its subsoil, and with regard to other activities for the economic exploitation and exploration of the zone, such as the production of energy from the water, currents and winds;”

Article 62 covers fishing and states:

“The coastal State [the UK] shall determine its capacity to harvest the living resources of the exclusive economic zone. Where the coastal State does not have the capacity to harvest the entire allowable catch, it shall, through agreements or other arrangements…. give other States access to the surplus of the allowable catch….”

In short, the coastal state – in this case the United Kingdom – has first call on all fish within its EEZ. Those it does not have the capacity to catch it can offer to other states, with whom it can make an annual agreement. In section 4 it lists all the rights and duties of coastal country concerned. Our ‘Starmer Scoreboard’ is based on that list of requirements that the UK can make on any foreign country wishing to fish in its waters.

Most importantly, under the UNCLOS law to which the EU and the UK are signatories, it is the coastal state (the UK) that determines quotas and how they are used.

‘Grandfather rights’ and Emmanuel Macron

Anyone who read our short series on how President Macron threatened to turn off the UK’s lights (by disconnecting undersea power cables) if the UK didn’t grant enough licences to French boats might wonder what the UNCLOS treaty has to say on this. The answer is that it recognises “the need to minimize economic dislocation in States whose nationals have habitually fished in the zone.”

The UK certainly did this and in fact bent over backwards in doing so.  In the end the requirements to prove that a French boat had once been fishing in UK waters were so minimal as to be almost non-existent. One extra condition of the new fishing deal should be that any licence sold to a French boat that has subsequently been sold or that has been replaced by a bigger boat of the same name should be revoked.

By the time the current deal expires in June next year, the EU countries will have had 10 years to plan and adjust since the Referendum in 2016. It must be remembered that the return of the UK’s waters was a key theme throughout the campaign and thereafter, so it is not as if the other countries and their fishermen thought nothing would change.

A sea-change in our fishing industry and coastal communities

The deal we have outlined above is based on the international treaty and it puts British fishermen first. Finally they will be able to plan for the future and start to regrow the decimated UK fishing fleet.

Fishing was always the lifeblood of many of our coastal communities around Britain’s and Northern Ireland’s shores. This deal will act like an infusion and give the industry a new lease of life. This in turn will have a positive effect on the coastal towns and villages they serve, as well as to the fish processing industry located in surrounding areas.

Put together with a ‘fishing for a healthier life’ campaign to stimulate demand, we will see the side benefit of a healthier population.  Some of our younger generation have grown up never having tasted some of the most nutricious food they could eat – and all from the wealth of the UK’s natural resources.

OBSERVATIONS

We patrol the world’s seas and uphold maritime law on the other side of the planet. Why can’t we do it at home?

Sir Keir and international law and prestige

Sir Keir is very keen on international law and wants the UK to hold up its head high on the world stage. He invoked this on his Chagos Islands giveaway during several sessions in Parliament.

Question:

How is it possible that an international lawyer can be about to sign a pact that ignores the international treaty (and law) of the seas which is followed the world over?

Answer:

He is so smitten by his love for the EU that he will compromise every principle he holds and do anything his beloved asks.

Meanwhile it will be our long-suffering fishermen and all those in our coastal communities who will feel the devastation of his ‘surrender summit’ tomorrow. They may be situated a long way from Sir Keir’s North London stomping ground, but one thing is sure. He will feel the effect of his sell-out very strongly when all the 100+ coastal constituencies around the country vote for anyone other than the Labour candidate at the next general election.

Sadly we expect Sir Keir to score ‘nul points’ in our little test above. However there’s a still a year to go before the current deal with the EU expires. That’s plenty of time to push back on all the worst aspects of the framework he agrees tomorrow.

Let’s not forget that the devil of any deal is in the detail. If we can chip away at that, we can end up with a substantially improved deal. It won’t be ideal but it will be better than if we did nothing. This will then make it easier when there’s a change of government and we can really put things right.

Right now we just need as many people as possible to get behind us at The UK Fisheries Campaign, at UKFish.Org. We really hope you will support us in this fight to win back sovereignty over the UK’s waters.