Martin Kenny (Sligo-Leitrim, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister and the officials for the presentation. I fully appreciate where he is coming from with regard to the Common Fisheries Policy, as there must be some kind of common approach with all the other EU member states. We can term what we are looking at as UK waters - until now, they were all EU waters - and it represents 17% of the overall EU fisheries, including the Mediterranean, the Baltic Sea and all that. We can take just the North Atlantic section, which is really what we are talking about, and it represents up to 30% of it or more. In that context, it is hard to see how one cannot look at the Common Fisheries Policy, as we are looking at such a large lump of it being taken away.

The agreement, which amounted to a number of letters signed in the 1960s, set up a practice that had no legal standing at a time when all the island of Ireland was outside the EU, and later when the island of Ireland was inside the EU. The big difference now is that a section of the island of Ireland will be outside the EU when the remainder is inside the EU. That is what is throwing up the controversy. I understand where the Minister is coming from in trying to put back in place the notion of fishermen, and particularly small fishermen on parts of the island, being able to fish up and down the coast. That is perfectly understandable. The difficulty is that Brexit throws it up in the air. There is also the possibility of other vessels and people coming in and registering from overseas; for examples, Dutch vessels could be registered in Northern Ireland and have the right to fish in Irish waters.