Call made to suspend Faroese vessels from EU waters

Fisheries leaders are calling for Faroese vessels to be suspended from EU waters amid fresh concerns about mackerel catches to the west of the islands.

It follows the discovery that a Faroese boat grossly under-reported mackerel mixed into a blue whiting catch in Denmark last week.

Faroe was granted renewed access to EU waters two-and-a-half years ago after a political deal that awarded their boats a generous share of EU mackerel quotas.

Shetland Fishermen’s Association executive officer Simon Collins said: “The UK and Scottish governments and the European Commission need urgently to suspend Faroese access to review the current arrangements.

“There remains considerable anger in Shetland and elsewhere in Scotland over the amount of mackerel Faroe is permitted to catch.

“But it seems that even this is not enough and now their vessels are allegedly disguising landings of fish caught to the west of Shetland.

“Talk about giving an inch and taking a mile, they were given a mile and now they are taking 20. This has to stop. We want a fair and well-managed fishery.”