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Marine and Coastal Access Bill [HL]

I cannot answer the question for the Minister, but he may get the missive that he requires from the Box. I think that in a previous debate his noble friend Lord Davies of Oldham laid great stress on the fact that the common fisheries policy is under review—we hope that it will move on in a more sensible direction—and is about to be devolved in a number of important ways. I wonder whether the explanation that the Minister is giving us could be incorporated in the subsection, because then it would make sense. As it stands, it baldly states that, for reasons that are unexplained, sea fishing is given special treatment. If it were linked to the superiority—that is a dangerous word—of the CFP in its current form, I think that we would all accept that it had logic. However, as it stands, I do not think that the Minister’s explanation—valid though it may well be—is sufficient to justify the incorporation in the Bill of this very special treatment.