Natural Resources Committee: Marine Scalefish Fishery Summary of Evidence 2014-17

The Hon. S.W. KEY (Ashford) (11:34): I move:

That the 125^th report of the committee, entitled Marine Scalefish Fishery Summary of Evidence 2014-17, be noted.

The issue of declining marine scale stocks was raised in the Natural Resources Committee via an emailed letter to the Hon. Dennis Hood MLC back in June 2014. The letter was written by Mr Robert Knight of Cape Jervis, with Mr Knight describing a situation where southern calamari squid numbers around Cape Jervis had declined considerably. Mr Knight hypothesised that this reported decline was also impacting other species. I am going to leave my report at this stage to see if other members want to speak, but I would ask that the report be noted.

Mr PENGILLY (Finniss) (11:35): I want to make some brief comments, as the member for Ashford made comments in relation to a gentleman from Cape Jervis and the squid fishery. My advice from longstanding members of that community and people who have been involved in the fishing industry there for a very long time is that that is not correct. I do not have the figures on me at the moment, I am sorry, but their catch rates indeed are very good still and the fish are going through on a regular basis. It is a habitat for squid and, of course, it is fished.

I do know Mr Knight. It has created a lot of division at Cape Jervis, and I suspect that there are far more in favour of the fishery than those who quite rightfully express concern, but I am not sure about the scientific basis. I think it is something we need to talk to PIRSA about to get a real indication of what is going on there.

I know one of the skippers on the SeaLink ferries whose son is a professional squid fisherman who, along with some others, is still doing very well out of it. I do not want to hold up the house, but I want to put those comments on the record for future Natural Resources Committees to have a bit of a think about and perhaps get some information from PIRSA.

Mr TRELOAR (Flinders) (11:37): I rise to make a contribution on this report from the Natural Resources Committee, entitled, 'Marine scalefish fishery summary of evidence 2014-17: good things come to those who bait'. I was particularly interested in this report and I would like to take most of my time this morning speaking to it because it was of very great interest to a number of professional fishers and recreational fishers in the electorate of Flinders. Of course, the electorate of Flinders extends from Cowell right around to the Western Australian border. It has extensive coastline and is really important to both the professional and recreational sector fishing involved there.

The marine scale fishery is a multispecies and multigear fishery consisting of some 60 species, including the most important ones: King George whiting, southern garfish and southern calamari. A number of stakeholders are involved, including commercial and recreational fishers. PIRSA are both promoters and regulars of the marine scalefish fishery and operate within the framework of the Fisheries Management Act and associated regulations.

A lot of the evidence we received—and I will go through some of it shortly—highlighted what was perceived to be mismanagement of fish stocks over a long period of time. Even though the committee did not come to a conclusion or make recommendations because it was not an official inquiry, we were actually accepting evidence, and that evidence proved to be most interesting.

The fishery is managed primarily through the issuing of licences (limiting total catch effort), conditions on licences and gear entitlements. The fishery is also subject to temporal and/or spatial closures. SARDI provides PIRSA and the industry with regular reports on stock assessments for the key species. As I said earlier, King George whiting, garfish, calamari and also snapper are much sought after local species. SARDI uses the terms 'sustainable', 'transitional-recovering', 'transitional-depleting', 'overfished', environmentally limited' and 'undefined' to describe the triggers for management intervention of the fishery. SARDI utilises a catch per unit effort model from commercial fishers to obtain data and model information on fish stocks.

As I said, much evidence was submitted, particularly from Eyre Peninsula and the West Coast. I would like to thank Mr Hugh Bayly in particular, who is a constituent of mine and a regular communicator with my office, for the effort he made, firstly, in ensuring the committee receive this evidence and also in garnering interested fishers to make submissions. I might just talk quickly about some of those local fishers who took the time to make a submission.

Mr David Sherry from Port Lincoln is a commercial marine scalefish fisher who has written about the changes he has experienced in commercial efforts since the 1960s. Mr Tony Custance, from Elliston—who, along with David, came in and presented evidence in person in the very early days of this committee hearing—is a commercial marine scalefish fisher. His position is that he believes fish stocks are currently sustainable within the marine scalefish fishery. He does, however, share his concerns with the management of the fishery, particularly with what he perceives to be the lack of management of the recreational fishing sector.

Another thing that came out, and I do not mind being frank about this, was the conflict sometimes between the professional sector and the recreational sector. The most difficult thing is that although we get reasonably good data from the professional marine scalefish sector, it is very difficult to get good reliable data from the recreational sector. That is something that needs to be addressed in the coming years in an effort to manage this fishery in a sustainable and appropriate way.

Mr Jarrod Day from Port Lincoln has only recently purchased a marine scalefish fishing licence, but he has also been involved in various fisheries since 1999, particularly crayfish and marine scalefish fishing. Mr Day's concerns are focused on the economic sustainability and capacity of the industry. Mr Phillip Hadlow from South Australia is a commercial marine scalefish fisher and specialises in whiting in the Lower Spencer Gulf and West Coast to Flinders Island areas. Mr Hadlow's concerns reflect those of Mr Day on the economic sustainability of the fishery, and I quote:

I believe the practice of leasing licences is a big problem for the fishery, and has added enormous pressure to stocks and created trouble amongst the Fishermen as long term fishermen have had to compete with short term operators who are under a lot of financial pressure to make ends meet.

Mr Hadlow had concerns for the licence fees, which were once upon a time as low as $20 annually but now are over $5,000, and also for the continuity of key PIRSA staff. He said:

…there has never been any continuance with the Directors and management staying put long enough to know the history and comings and goings of the fishery.

Mr Hadlow also expressed concerns about recreational fishing, stating:

This sector is a huge problem for the sustainability of stocks, as the numbers are ever increasing, as well as their boats and technology is always improving making the impact more critical.

I suspect the recreational fishers may be of the same view, but in exactly the opposite context.

Mr Allan Suter, of course known to many as the Mayor of the District Council of Ceduna, holds a commercial fishing licence for the marine scalefish fishery but is close to retirement and not reliant for his income on this licence. He made the point that this was a personal submission rather than a submission from the council.

Mr Suter's concerns were in line with submissions from other commercial fishers in that he expresses concern over what he considers is a declining fishery, both in terms of socioeconomics and ecology. Specifically, Mr Suter's concerns are the lack of size limits for gummy shark and wrasse, rising costs of fees and dropping values of licences. I suspect that in recent weeks the value of those licences have dropped even further, given that there is no longer the opportunity to transfer licences.

Mr Hugh Bayly, who I mentioned earlier, is a very enthusiastic and long-time career fisherman. He is also very keen to effect some change, and he has come to me as his local member and to the committee to begin that process. Mr Bayly made a submission and introduced the committee to the multiple complexities of life as a marine scalefish fisher and the practicalities of being at the receiving end of complex regulations designed to regulate a multigear and multispecies fishery.

Mr Bayly would like to call for an inquiry specifically into the cost recovery process of the marine scale fishery. That is likely to be in the life of the next parliament. It certainly will not happen between now and the end of the year. Mr Bayly questioned the lack of flexibility of the legislation and, in particular, the prescriptive manner of gear and species regulation on licences. He also pointed out that there are practical challenges, even with the recent compensation, to have four seven-day blocks per year to operate the licence. I quote:

…fishing is governed by weather more than anything. You can't say to somebody, 'here, have a seven-day block in the middle of July.' You will be out there fishing for three days then it will blow for four days and those seven days are gone. So, for a start, it should at least be the individual 28 days.

So these are very practical contributions from these fishers.

Mr David Pedro, who I know, is a chef in Port Lincoln who specialises in seafood. He has been a chef in Lincoln and I understand he is leaving soon. His concern is that South Australia will lose the marine scale fishery altogether and, as a consequence, South Australia will lose its reputation for offering fresh local produce. Mr Ian Fitzgerald, Deputy Chair of RecFish SA said:

RecFish SA would like to see more precautionary management of our fisheries for the long term benefit of fish stocks and thus the long term benefits for the ecology and the community. While we understand the need for commercial fishers to be efficient, the use of highly efficient methods and gear can easily result in overexploitation.

Technology has taken boats and other pieces of equipment to a place that could not have been imagined I suggest when some of this legislation was first drafted. From the committee's point of view, the future of the marine scale fishery is somewhat uncertain. The only real clarity that has now emerged is that the scale fishery is a highly complex fishery to manage, with many different stakeholders, all of whom have different needs for and concerns about the fishery. Further, it was highlighted to me how relatively few species are targeted. We are very particular. I mentioned them earlier: whiting, garfish calamari and snapper. That is the majority of the effort and maybe there is an opportunity to exploit further fisheries.

Finally, the committee's position on this matter is that the fishery would most likely benefit from a focused inquiry with clearly defined terms of reference. As I said earlier, we will leave that to the next parliament.

The Hon. S.W. KEY (Ashford) (11:47): I would like to thank members for their contributions, particularly the member for Finniss and the member for Flinders. This report represents a snapshot or a summary of the evidence collated. The member for Flinders has gone through a lot of that evidence and I thank him for doing that. This is not a comprehensive report. My view and I think the view of the committee is that this needs further work. As the member for Flinders has already said, issues around the management of marine scalefish fisheries really need a thorough parliamentary inquiry or an investigation based on clear terms of reference. Our committee collected information over a long period of time, but it will be obvious in the report that we have not made recommendations because we believe that we need further time and expertise to do that.

I would like to commend the members of the committee—the Hon. Robert Brokenshire MLC, the Hon. John Dawkins MLC, the member for Napier, the member for Flinders, the member for Colton and the Hon. John Gazzola—for their contributions. All members have worked cooperatively on this report. I think it would be fair to say that most of the members on our committee had a great interest in this subject, so they were very enthusiastic about the committee receiving excellent evidence and information, not always in agreement. I would like to thank the parliamentary staff for their assistance. They have waded through this report as well. I commend 'Good things come to those who bait' as a report to our committee.

Motion carried.