That was Barnier's statement after the last round of official negotiations ended on 21st August. https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/fr/STATEMENT_20_1511 The way I read his later statements is that the EU won't discuss fishing until the UK has moved on other areas, not the other way round. As I said, once we agree on the Level Playing Field, they'll move on fishing.
LPF is by far the major issue, but for whatever reason, Barnier is raising the anti on fishing. As per his claims in the last couple of days that fish in UK waters belong to the EU
I wonder how it will play with EU states that have an economic interest in a Brexit deal, but don't have a fishing industry