Section 51 – Modification of the Fisheries Act 1981: enforcement of EU rules
144.Section 51 makes a technical amendment to section 30(1) of the Fisheries Act 1981 to extend its geographic scope to, and to allow enforcement of EU obligations and restrictions on, Scottish fishing boats outside of the Scottish zone.
145.This amendment will allow for new EU regulations to be fully and properly enforced at the point that they come into effect, not only in respect of all vessels within the Scottish Zone as at present, but also in respect of Scottish fishing vessels wherever they are and any persons in Scotland whose activities are subject to EU rules on the regulation of commercial sea fisheries. The changes will simply alter the legislative basis on which a contravention of EU law would be enforced. In other words EU regulations that would otherwise be enforced through a statutory instrument will be directly enforceable under the 1981 Act through the amendment.
