A Marine Management Organisation

To ensure that plans would be put into practise effectively, LINK is campaigning for:

A marine management organisation to take charge of planning, licensing and enforcement at sea.

Under the current system, planning, licensing and enforcement is undertaken in a piecemeal way, by numerous public bodies, including but by no means limited to, Departments of the UK and Scottish Governments, Local Authorities, Crown Estate, Harbour Boards, Historic Scotland, Marine Coastguard Agency, Scottish Environment Protection Agency, Scottish Fisheries Protection Agency, Scottish Natural Heritage and Scottish Water.

A Scottish Marine Management Organisation (SMMO) would be a national decision-making body overseeing planning of devolved activities in Scottish waters. It would be the central point of expertise and communication on marine matters in Scotland and be responsible to Scottish ministers. It would also link with and work closely with a UK Marine Management Organisation.

To make sure that the Scottish Marine Bill is effective, the Scottish Marine Management Organisation would:

Develop, implement, monitor and enforce the Marine Spatial Plans;

Decide conditions for licenses, permissions and consents;

Pull together research, stakeholder contributions and opinions and advice.