should be lifted, the party said yesterday.

Shadow Environment Minister Mr. Julian Hall stressed the study would not pre-judge the issue.

But PLP candidate Mr. Danny Farias, joining Mr. Hall at a campaign press briefing, renewed his attack on the ban.

"The Bermudian people have been deprived of their natural resources,'' he said.

Fisherman Mr. Farias has campaigned fiercely against the ban since Government said it was needed to protect reef fish.

Asked if it had worked, he said: "It's worked in the sense that we've caught no fish.

"The fish that we were supposed to be taking we have not been taking. The fish are there.'' Mr. Hall said a review of the ban should be a "matter of first priority''.

"We don't pre-judge the results of that review. It is not PLP policy that the fish pot ban should not have been put in place.

"It is policy that the manner in which it was put into place was highly questionable.'' Compensation to fishermen had to be part of the review, he said. In its effect on them the ban's introduction "bordered on the inhumane''.

"It was completely devoid of any sense of natural justice or any real consensus-seeking.'' Before the ban, he said, "there at least appeared to be serious cause for concern regarding depletion of fish stocks''.

"Some form of corrective action appears, on the face of things, to have been necessary,'' he said.

Mr. Hall also highlighted other promises on the environment: "Bermuda's fishermen will be supported in efforts to develop deep-sea fisheries on a solid commercial basis. A PLP Government would do everything possible to ensure that such a developing fishing industry will be Bermudian owned.'' A PLP Government would compensate people "opting not to develop appropriate privately-owned areas where zoning would prevent development''.