Sea Fisheries Act 1968

7 Sea-fishery officers

(1) The following persons shall be British sea-fishery officers for the purposes of the Sea Fisheries Acts, that is to say—

(a) officers of the sea-fishery inspectorates of each of the appropriate Ministers other than assistant fishery officers;

(b) commissioned officers of any of Her Majesty's ships;

(c) persons in command or charge of any aircraft or hovercraft of the Royal Navy, the Army or the Royal Air Force;

(d) officers of the fishery protection service of the Secretary of State holding the rank of commander, first officer or second officer;

(e) officers of Customs and Excise ;

(f) the following members of the Coastguard, that is to say, inspectors, district officers and members in charge of coastguard stations;

(g) other persons appointed as British sea-fishery officers by one of the appropriate Ministers.

(2) The appropriate Minister may appoint any person to exercise and perform the powers and duties of a British sea-fishery officer subject to such limitations as may be specified in the instrument appointing him; and for the purposes of the Sea Fisheries Acts a person so appointed shall be a British sea-fishery officer within those limitations, but not otherwise.

(3) An appointment made under subsection (2) above may be limited in any one or more of the following ways, that is to say—

(a) to particular matters;

(b) to a particular area ;

(c) to a particular order or class of orders.

(4) In this Act, " foreign sea-fishery officer ", in relation to any convention with respect to the conduct or safeguarding of fishing operations or operations ancillary thereto to which Her Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom is a party, means a person of any class specified in an order made by the Ministers, being a person appointed by the government of any other country which is a party to the convention to enforce its provisions or any other person having power under the laws of that other country to enforce those provisions.

(5) In this section " the appropriate Minister " means—

(a) in relation to England and Wales, the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food ;

(b) in relation to Scotland, the Secretary of State ; and

(c) in relation to Northern Ireland, the Ministry of Agriculture for Northern Ireland.