Minister in hot water over fish quotas

Proposals to help small fishermen get a larger share of the fishing quota have been allegedly ignored by the minister in favour of powerful interests

Stephen Gadd

Esben Lunde Larsen, the agriculture and food minister, has been accused of lying to Parliament over the allocation of fish quotas, Berlingske reports.

READ ALSO: Government hooks new Baltic Sea fishing quotas

Six parties, led by Danske Folkeparti and Socialdemokratiet, believe the minister has, at the very least, withheld information.

The big fish get the most
The issue has arisen because by far the largest proportion of the available fish quotas end up being given to a small number of rich, powerful, fishing interests. A majority in Parliament, excluding the government, want something done about this so that small fishermen also get a look-in.

The minister was asked to come up with a solution, and to that end he was presented with 16 concrete ideas as to what could be done, a document from the Danish AgriFish Industry reveals. However, so far, he has only come up with one suggestion. He has also denied seeing the 16 ideas.

A full explanation in the pipeline
“I’ve absolutely no desire to keep back information and, as far as I know, I’ve not been presented with the ideas from Danish AgriFish Industry that Berlingske is referring to,” Larsen told DR Nyheder.

When pressed further on the matter of whether he could be absolutely sure that he’d not been given the document, the minister said: “We’ll address that at a hearing where I will naturally give a full explanation regarding how things stand on this issue.”

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