My Lords, I am grateful for Amendment 123, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Teverson. I welcome the opportunity to set out the arrangements already in place for ensuring such co-ordination, because I believe the Bill supports the aims of the noble Lord’s amendment. I will address the amendment as two parts.
First, the Maritime and Coastguard Agency and the Marine Management Organisation have distinct and separate regulatory functions. The MCA is responsible for providing a 24-hour maritime search and rescue service around the UK coast, as well as producing legislation and guidance on maritime matters, and certification for seafarers. The MCA is sponsored by the Department for Transport, as its responsibilities relate to vessels and infrastructure. By contrast, the MMO licenses, regulates and plans marine activities in the seas around England to ensure they are carried out in a sustainable way.
Notwithstanding this distinction, there are areas of shared interest where these organisations already co-ordinate and work jointly to achieve their regulatory purpose effectively. This includes the operation of aerial assets for monitoring and surveillance, the collocation of personnel in the Joint Maritime Operations Coordination Centre, and intelligence sharing. Opportunities for further collaboration and efficiencies are still being identified.
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Turning to the second part of the proposed amendment, I do take on board the concerns referred to by the noble Lord, particularly given his experience,
and I will take those back to the department. The MMO and inshore fisheries and conservation authorities, or IFCAs, are working collaboratively increasingly well. The Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009, to which the noble Lord referred, enshrines consistent and co-ordinated co-operation in the general objective and duty to co-operate provisions.
In recognition of the benefits of close co-operation, the organisations have drawn up a memorandum of understanding for a co-ordinated approach to, amongst other things, effective management of fisheries and the marine environment, information and intelligence sharing, and joint patrols and the sharing of fishery patrol vessels. These memoranda are reviewed as necessary following any pertinent changes to the policies, procedures or structures of the parties concerned.
In practice, this has resulted in a joint intelligence provision between the MMO and the IFCAs, including tactical co-ordination groups to direct risk-based intelligence-led compliance and enforcement activity. Throughout 2019, the IFCAs were further integrated into the JMOCC, and inshore activity is now visible to, and co-ordinated across, the national maritime domain.
I have noted the role of the JMOCC, and your Lordships will be aware of its function to enhance capability and capacity across the maritime regulators, agencies and devolved administrations. The MMO and the MCA have committed to collocate personnel within the JMOCC.
I reassure noble Lords that effective co-ordination exists between maritime regulators and is already mandated within the Marine and Coastal Access Act. No further regulation or consultation is required. Opportunities to improve operational relationships and to collaborate more efficiently and effectively are continuously sought.
On accountability to Parliament, I further reassure noble Lords that additional legislation is not required in this area. Schedule 1 of the Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009 commits the MMO to deliver an annual report to the Secretary of State on how it has discharged its functions. This report is laid before both Houses, and the MMO is accountable to Parliament for its contents. MMO annual reports typically include details of collaborative work with other marine regulators.
Turning to Amendment 128, tabled by my noble friend, the Bill is designed to replace the common fisheries policy, and I have been advised by parliamentary counsel that the short title is appropriate. They have advised that a short title does not need to be comprehensive; it just needs to give a good idea of what the Bill is mostly about. In this case, that is replacing the common fisheries policy. The Bill’s short title is the Fisheries Act 2020, which therefore seems appropriate.
Your Lordships will also be aware that the long title sets out the scope of the Bill, which includes the term “marine conservation”. However, this sits alongside the term “fishing, fisheries and aquaculture”, and its inclusion should be taken in the context of protecting the marine environment from those activities. Adding “marine conservation” to the short title might suggest that the Act should include provisions relating to the protection of the marine environment and wildlife
from a wider range of activities, such as energy production, shipping and tourism. However, I am advised that, in reality, changing the short title has no legal effect.
I should also draw my noble friend’s attention to the fisheries objectives in Clause 1, the first of which is sustainability; the third is the ecosystem objective. We also have the Environment Bill, which will cover many of the issues to which the noble Lord rightly drew our attention. They are in its objectives.
In light of this explanation, I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, will withdraw his amendment.