The Scottish Conservatives have written to Mairi McAllan demanding clarity over her plans for controversial fishing restrictions, amid “flatly contradictory messages” from the SNP and Greens.
In a ministerial statement last week, the net zero and just transition secretary signalled an apparent U-turn on Highly Protected Marine Areas, in response to warnings from fishing communities that they would decimate the industry.
However, a commitment to HPMAs forms part of the Bute House power-sharing agreement between the Greens and the SNP – and in a weekend interview Green MSP Ariane Burgess insisted both parties remained committed to introducing the restrictions.
Shadow rural affairs secretary Rachael Hamilton has now written to Mairi McAllan urging her to come clean on whether HPMAs have been “genuinely ditched or simply delayed pending a cosmetic rebrand”.
Scottish Conservative shadow rural affairs secretary Rachael Hamilton MSP said: “The cabinet secretary has a duty to tell Scotland’s fishing communities the truth about the coalition’s plans for HPMAs – because she and the Greens are giving flatly contradictory messages.
“Like many people, I was not convinced that Mairi McAllan’s statement last week sounded the death knell for these devastating fishing restrictions because they form a central plank of the Bute House agreement between the SNP and the Greens.
“Ariane Burgess’s comments on the BBC’s Sunday Show have cemented my fear that the ministerial statement was just a cynical stalling tactic to buy off rebel SNP MSPs, and that the restrictions will reappear in a different guise.
“So I have written to Mairi McAllan in search of clarity.
“Livelihoods are on the line if the extremist Greens get their way, so people in our coastal communities must be told if these curbs have been genuinely ditched or simply delayed pending a cosmetic rebrand.”
Notes
A copy of Rachael Hamilton’s letter to Mairi McAllan is attached.
Transcript of relevant section of Ariane Burgess’ Sunday Show interview:
Fiona Stalker: I just want to ask you while you're on Ms Burgess about the agreement, the Bute House agreement, between the Greens and the SNP. This week, of course plans to legislate for Highly Protected Marine Areas were ditched by your SNP partners. We've seen the bottle Deposit Return Scheme dropped. Is the agreement going to survive or is this the beginning of the end, do you think?
Ariane Burgess: The agreement is totally intact and we are constantly in conversation with our colleagues in the SNP, and I am confident that the marine protections that we're both committed to bringing in will come forward. And what we're doing as is taking the conversation to the communities and designing something together that will ensure that we have long-term fishing for 20 years, 30 years, 100 years from now. What we're both absolutely committed to is that marine protections need to be brought forward.