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Marine and Coastal Access Bill [HL]

The amendment is of great interest to me as a Welsh Member of this House. I deduce from it that Clause 41(2) would be taken out of the Bill and subsection (3) would remain, and I conclude that that would leave the Secretary of State determining by order where the division to which the noble Lord, Lord Glentoran, referred would occur. My understanding from the briefing that we received recently from the Minister, which was extremely helpful, was that the negotiations on the boundary between the Welsh zone and that of Ireland were at an advanced stage. I note that the last few words of subsection (3) are: "““British fishery limits adjacent to Wales, and those which are not””." I assume that that refers to the offshore area. Will the Minister confirm that I have interpreted that correctly? I would prefer subsection (2) to be left in, although, as the noble Lord, Lord Glentoran, says, perhaps the definition of where the limits are needs to be much more exact—I can see the point in that argument—so that no doubt is left about where they are. It would be better for the definition of the Welsh zone to remain in the Bill as it is in subsection (2); there is quite a lot of scope for defining more clearly in subsection (3) the words ““those which are not””. I will be very interested in the Minister’s response to the amendment and his views, on behalf of the Government, of the proposed exclusion of subsection (2).