Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I wish to be perfectly clear because I wish to be specific on the matter. Ciaran Byrne, chief executive officer of Inland Fisheries Ireland, IFI, has always made himself available to everyone concerned. He has visited on Friday afternoons and on Wednesdays. He has gone to Dundalk. His senior management team has met on a number of occasions with interested parties. The first point is very clear, the IFI and I are very happy to meet and to look at all the facts. However, we must deal with the facts and they are as I will outline.

First, it is not true to say, as Deputy Nash said, that there is no fishing on the Boyne. There is fishing on the Boyne on a catch-and-release basis. That allows people to fish and to catch but it does not allow them to keep. The Deputy is probably misinformed in that respect.

The standing scientific committee for salmon has identified 143 rivers throughout the country which contain 152 fisheries, as some rivers have other tributaries. In 2013, a total of 94 fisheries were open for angling. Of these, 62 fisheries are open because there was a surplus of fish. A total of 32 fisheries are classified as open for angling on a catch-and-release basis only and 58 fisheries are closed as they have no surplus of fish.

In 2006, the Government committed to alignment with the scientific advice and moved to restrict the harvest of fish to those which meet the conservation limits. The effect of this advice was that the mixed stock fisheries were closed. Indiscriminate mixed stock salmon fishing at sea was ceased, that is, drift netting at sea was effectively stopped.

There are five salmon rivers in the Dundalk district which are scientifically assessed on an annual basis, the River Flurry, the River Fane, the Castletown River, the River Dee and the River Glyde. Only one salmon river in the Drogheda district is scientifically assessed on an annual basis and that is the River Boyne. In 2013, one of these six rivers, the River Fane, is open for the harvesting of salmon. Of the remainder, the River Flurry is closed to all angling, and the remainder the River Boyne, the River Glyde, the Castletown river and the River Dee are open for catch and release angling.

This country manages salmon stocks on an individual river basis due to the fact that each river contains a genetically unique stock, which migrates to sea as juveniles and returns to the same river in adulthood to spawn. The conservation imperative means that exploitation of salmon in each river is only permitted where the independent standing scientific committee for salmon, SSCS, which includes expertise from the National Parks and Wildlife Service, NPWS, the Loughs Agency, LA, the ESB, and the Marine Institute, MI, determine that the stock in that river is above the conservation limit. The decision is not a political or administrative decision; it is based on science. The conservation limits are set out in the reply.

Significant analysis has been carried out by Inland Fisheries Ireland through the use of catchment wide electro-fishing to determine salmon fry abundance. In other words, it is not just based on conservation figures, as experts carry out tests in the fisheries to establish whether some fish were not identified. Further research is carried out to establish that. The goal of IFI is to protect the stock and to make it available for the future. If the conservation limit is exceeded, it is possible to catch and keep fish.

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