Mr. Eamon O'Corcora:

Gabhaim buíochas leis an choiste as cuireadh a thabhairt dúinn teacht anseo inniu. Táimid anseo ar son na mbád beag faoi deich méadar le ceadúnas ilfhiúsach lán. Is tionscal an-tábhachtach é seo don phobal cois farraige agus do phobal na Gaeltachta.

I thank the Chairman for the opportunity to make a presentation here and put forward our views. This industry is very important to the Gaeltacht and coastal communities, particularly along the west coast. We are the forgotten people of Ireland and we feel our industry has been a scapegoat over the years and forgotten about. The situation is getting worse and we are hopeful that something can be done about it.

We have several aims and objectives, the first of which is to maintain a sustainable future for the commercial, inshore under ten metres sector. In order to do this, we need access to all of the stocks. We have been banned from fishing many stocks, which puts pressure on the shellfish. There is a need for very aggressive conservation and rejuvenation programmes in certain areas. For example, there is a conservation programme in place with the V-notching of lobsters, but we feel there is a far better way of conserving these stocks by allowing the females to breed in hatcheries and putting the juvenile fish out to sea, back to their natural habitat. Tests are being done on this at the moment and the breeding success rate is up to 20% better than with V-notching. We believe this method should be used for both lobsters and crayfish.

We need an industry-led cohesive management plan to ensure sustainable supplies. In that context, we are calling for the setting up of a central fisheries management board, with five fishermen from this sector on that board. Proper marketing is another key issue because at the moment, the lobster and shellfish market is at an all-time low. The European market is not the place to be going with much of the catch. There is a large amount of lobster being imported from outside the EU which is affecting the price. There are many other markets to be exploited. Lobsters can be dry-packed now and sent on within a few hours of being caught. The development of markets outside of Europe is vital but cannot happen unless a proper management structure is put in place. We feel that the system that has been in place for the last 30 years has not worked, unfortunately. There are many problems in our industry but no one is listening. Solutions must be found through collaboration.

The development of new management structures must be industry led and all stakeholders must be consulted. The central fisheries board that we are seeking would co-ordinate the management of the inshore sector. This could be done by regional committees advising the board of problems in certain areas. The approach must be adaptable and flexible and must not be a heavy-handed one. A streamlining of the licensing in the commercial sector is needed. The marketing and labelling of fish is very important. Labels must include information on where the fish is caught and by which vessels. We also need clearly defined rules and regulations regarding seasonal entitlements and so forth.

I will move on to our proposed management measures. Fishing seasons for different species has been an issue for all my life. I left school at 16 and my background is in fishing. We went from one season to the next and one species to the next. Many high value species can be fished on the west coast so one can take out a small amount for much greater reward. As a conservation measure, we must consider days at sea versus quotas. Minimum landing sizes must be respected and different types and different lengths of fishing gear must be considered. Other proposed measures included limited access through controlled fishing, proper monitoring, V-notching programmes, onshore hatcheries, and area closures where required for specific times. This does not involve closing an area and leaving it closed forever, which does not work.

We are also trying to get across the importance of the full polyvalent licence, which is basically a multifunctional licence. It allows someone to fish several species using different types of gear. These are the types of licences we had until 2005, at which point restricted licences came onstream. However, the criteria kept changing and, coupled with the salmon ban and the ban on the spurdog, it has been detrimental to shellfish. The real problem in pot licensing, which involves an area we do not represent, is the way it was administered and how licences were given to some people. There are many questions and we would like people to revisit the matter, examine it closely and see how it was done. Some 504 licences were issued although 700 licence applications were successful on the first day. It has decreased to 460 active licences. It created the problem. Coupled with the salmon ban and the ban on spurdogs, we have lost herring entitlements and we cannot fish for mackerel. It has had an awful effect. I do not know what can be done but something must be done. If not, the inevitable will happen and it will implode.

There are different minimum landing sizes for crayfish in the European markets. Our size is 110 mm while other countries have 95 mm and the European regulations and minimum landing sizes do not apply to fish coming from outside the EU into the European market. We are at a disadvantage. We tried to get the law changed so that the minimum landing size would be 100 mm and the maximum landing size 130 mm. This was rejected. This discriminates against the Irishman because we are going into the same markets as others who have different rules. We are told we are all Europeans but it seems that we are only Europeans when it suits us.

The ban on bass fishing is very contentious for the small boats sector. Whether boats are 6 m or 9.9 m, they are only capable of so much when taking into account weather conditions and the style of the hull. One can only do so much. It looks like a quota will be set. If it is set by Europe, will we have any quota in this country? The French, in particular, are fishing species in our waters. Who will compensate us for our loss of quota and the loss of livelihood? We have made suggestions in the past. The proposed management plan we sent in highlights this point. There are several methods of catching bass and we tried to get it open to line fishing and that certain vessels be allowed in on a pilot scheme. All proposals were rejected.

The salmon ban was the greatest disaster since the sinking of the Titanic. This tore the heart out of rural communities. People in rural communities, who are not all fishermen, have not spoken to each other in six or seven years. People believed the waffle they were listening to and now they cannot get local boats to supply them with one fish. It created an awful lot of bitterness. The salmon habitats directive was wrongly used. We do not agree with the science or the way it was presented. It was all one-sided and we would like to get the debate reopened. We must look at the problems of rural communities. People are emigrating. It is a very sad fact when one looks at the fishing industry. I come from Brandon, County Kerry, and when I started fishing in the early 1980s, there were 12 boats and 40 men going down to the pier every morning. There are now two boats and three men. My boat is a single-hand boat during the summer because it does not pay me to take anyone with me. Under the original driftnet legislation, it may be possible to give out a far lower number of licences than when the ban was introduced. These should be concentrated from Malin Head to Kinsale, which is the area people have suffered the most.

I had to go into a bank and borrow money to buy my licence and the fishing vessel, as did most of the other people, and we find we can no longer make a living with it. A small number of licences could be given out in strategic areas. We know there is a surplus of fish. With regard to where the figures came from and the number of counters in the rivers, the figure of four counters in four rivers is biting at me somewhere. All of a sudden, evidence was produced that rivers were below the survival limit. However, there were no fish counters in the rivers so I wonder where the information came from. That is what we would like to know. This was unjust on rural communities. Our proposed management plan provides for criteria for a small number of licences. This would make a big difference to communities from Donegal to Cork particularly.

The spurdog ban was a European thing but it was initiated by this country in the beginning. Spurdogs are so plentiful that I once unintentionally caught two tonnes of the stuff and I had to throw it over the side.

It is a very good and marketable fish which could be sent to the United Kingdom if we were allowed to catch it in a regulated fishery for vessels under 10 m. These boats cannot do much damage and if there was a regulated season and length of gear, it would alleviate the problems of shellfish.

There are many small bays along the coast and many of them are subject to the birds, habitats, Natura 2000 and other directives. However, from the end of September to February large pelagic vessels are fishing where there are only 4 fathoms of water - they are nearly raising sand off the bottom in taking the herrings. If some of these bays were closed and some of the smaller vessels were allowed to take a small quota, it would not do any harm. It would, however, make a big difference to us and very little difference to the others. Handing out high percentage quotas to large vessels is not the answer. It is detrimental to us and our communities.

Factory ships from other EU member states and outside the European Union are fishing for mackerel 40 miles west of the south west coast. They have a far smaller quota than the Irish mackerel fleet, yet they are spending ten months of the year there, maybe more sometimes. Why is this happening? How is it sustainable? Who is doing anything about it? Some deal should be made within Europe to take a small portion of the mackerel stock and not to bring it within the total allowable catch for hand lining by the small boats. Again, it is a very marketable fish.

We also have the problem of seals which I know is a hot potato. We asked fishermen all around the coast who own our own types of boat to count seals in their areas. We have come up with a very conservative figure of 50,000, which is totally unsustainable. We are not asking anybody to go out and kill seals, but perhaps some of them could be tranquilised and removed to some other jurisdiction because eventually they will have nothing to eat and will probably have to eat each other. Seals are a massive problem. There is no point going gill-netting for pollock or monkfish. Whatever scientific evidence is put up about seals, I can tell the committee for a fact that they are doing desperate damage. It must be possible to do something to reduce their numbers in some way.

We also have what we call the "alphabet" licences. When I started fishing, there was one type of fishing licence. There was a multifunctional polyvalent licence - basically a whitefish licence. It permitted fishing for so many species. However, boats now have licences with a "P" or an "A" or it could be any letter in front of them. Most of these licences have been given out for free, while others have had to spend a vast amount of money in buying capacity and then they can obtain a licence. This puts us at a great disadvantage. Those involved in the Tralee Bay oyster fishery have "A" licences. That is a managed fishery and doing no harm to anybody. However, there are other areas where it is impacting and we would like to see something done about it.

The trawling done by larger vessels affects smaller vessels. People not aligned to us have asked us to bring up this point. Big vessels tow heavy gear and ecological damage has been done to the seabed, including the tearing up of rocks, which means that small boats can no longer work there. If the people concerned were kept outside a certain limit, it might help.

For many years the use of small-mesh nets by other EU member state vessels has done damage to stocks of whitefish. Owing to the lack of rules on labelling, nobody knows whether fish imported from non-EU countries are farmed or wild. Pollution is a problem that has not been addressed.

I refer back to salmon fishing. During the time of the salmon ban a number of local authorities wrote to the then Minister, Mr. Pat "The Cope" Gallagher, MEP, to ask him to ban the practice of drift netting as it was damaging tourism. However, some of these local authorities installed sewerage systems which failed to meet EU standards. In some cases, they still do not meet EU standards. What has been done about this? They are doing much more damage than a small vessel of 6 m to 10 m.

We are totally opposed to cage fish farms at sea and have initiated a study which is far from complete. However, we have heard alarming reports of lice infestation and pollution. There is a proposal to build one of the largest fish farms in Europe. In the case of existing salmon farms, a team of divers should be sent down with sophisticated camera equipment to survey an area within half a mile of the cages and underneath them. This would provide clear evidence of whether they should proceed.

Another problem has been the lack of representation for those with vessels of less than 10 m. For years we have been trying to be recognised as representing a group. Until recently almost every door has been closed in our faces.

I will outline some solutions. We need a comprehensive management plan such as the one we suggested and a proper management structure, with local consultation. We need access to all stocks which can be fished to a sustainable level. We need to harmonise the landing criteria for crayfish, which is a major issue along the west coast. We need a comprehensive and aggressive breeding program for lobsters and crayfish. We need to look after the stock of juveniles. While the V-notching programme is welcome, it is only tinkering at the edges. Owing to the pressure on these stocks in recent years, they need an extra boost. If the stocks are there and healthy, the demand for natural wild fish will increase into the future. While we might not be around to see the benefits, somebody else will.

We need defined fishing seasons for certain species. That is what fishermen did when I was a boy.

They took a little of everything, which meant that there was a healthy stock of everything. That is the way forward. Part of the importance of full polyvalent licences is that they allow one to operate in such a manner. They do not restrict or put one under pressure. I hope the solutions we have proposed to these problems will be taken into consideration.

The introduction of onshore fish farms should involve renewable energy. I know people have been complaining about the cost of electricity, butt here are many sources of renewable energy. This approach would be very good for the environment and help the community. We have watched recently as people have spoken about creating jobs through fish farming in rural areas. With the possible exception of a few representatives of small areas, nobody seems to speak about or look at the potential for creating extra jobs in the wild fishery sector. It is just not on the cards and has not been for the past 30 years. It needs to be taken seriously. There needs to be an investment in small fish processing plants such as local smokeries for herring and mackerel in coastal communities because there are no jobs in these communities. As a result of the lack of investment, there is no infrastructure. There are no industries other than those supported by natural resources - fishing, farming and tourism.

I will conclude on that note. I thank members of the committee for listening to me.