Seán Kyne (Galway West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The Chairman is correct. Unfortunately, the Pacific pink salmon was found in Irish waters, in the Galway weir fishery, in June of this year and also in the River Erriff, in County Mayo. It is not a new occurrence. It occurs periodically, and incidents have been reported as far back as the 1970s, but we do not want this Pacific pink salmon to intermix and breed with our Atlantic salmon stocks. It is imperative, therefore, that anglers report catches of pink salmon to Inland Fisheries Ireland. There is a hot-line number, 1850 34 74 24, and it is important that if anglers come across these salmon they notify Inland Fisheries Ireland, which is keeping a close on this matter. It is an issue about which those of us in the Department are worried.

Regarding Deputy Lawless's comments, salmon stocks have gone through a precarious existence over many years. There was a ban on commercial drift netting in 2006. For the initial year, there was an increase in stock numbers. Since then, unfortunately, that increase has stopped and there has been a reduction. Thankfully, the reports for this year are better and this will help improve the five-year averaging in terms of each river's conservation limits. As the Deputy is aware, there is a process that is gone through based on science and international best practice. If one has a higher return in 2017, that will improve the five-year average of rivers. It is hoped that when this is put out to public consultation before the Christmas period, more rivers will be reaching the conservation limit and therefore could be opened for the 2018 season.

There are some 147 distinct stocks in rivers, river sections and estuaries and, as I said, an amount of scientific work is going on regarding salmon stocks. We do not know the reason there has been a decline in recent years, whether it is due to global warming, the big trawlers offshore, sea lice or disease, but my Department is acutely aware of the importance of the salmon stock for Ireland.