Michael Collins (Cork South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I have a few more questions I want to ask the Minister. I have listened closely for the past hour and a half, or however long it has been. There is an awful lot of talk that the SFPA is to blame, that the task force is to blame, that the task force going to work on this, or that the SFPA will bring things forward. Nobody is making decisions. As I have said, it now looks as though officials knew this in December. Nobody consulted anyone until April, which is shocking to say the least. That was the time to start talking, but instead we are doing the talking now. We will have another two months of talking and no answers for the man on the ground. That is what I need as a public representative - an answer for the man on the ground.

Our session is two hours long and I am delighted the Minister is here before us. In fairness, he has never shied away from us. I am not personalising any of my criticism, but I have serious concerns about what will happen in the next two months. The Minister has no solution. He is pushing it over to the SFPA and to our committee. We have ferocious power. We have far more power than I ever knew we had. We must bring the SFPA before us on a more frequent basis. It seemed to know something in December that it did not relay to the industry, the public or public representative by 16 April. Then we had a crisis and now we are now playing catch-up.

I am still asking the same question. Can the Minister intervene this evening, or tomorrow morning, to try at least to find a short-term solution that everyone will agree to? I think the system that was in place was quite adequate. The powers that be could say that it is not above our heads and stand up to Europe a small bit because we need some strength on the ground in Ireland. The Irish fishing industry is getting walked on left, right, and centre. To me, this is a push. There is so much apathy, unhappiness and mental health issues out there because of this carry-on that fishermen are going to say to themselves that they will get the hell out of this mess. This is a nice handy way to push them towards decommissioning. That is the feeling on the ground out there. What is going to happen? I asked the Minister that question yesterday. What will happen to the fishermen who decommission their boats, the people who work on those boats and the rural communities in Castletownbere and elsewhere? What will happen to those rural communities? What is planned for them? I would like an answer that goes beyond saying that the task force is coming forward with ideas. I want to know the thoughts of the Minister in this regard, rather than those of the task force. I want to know why four months elapsed. Now we are at a crisis stage. It looks like another two months will elapse before we get a decision. What is going to happen with the fishing industry? It is on its knees. I would appreciate it if the Minister would answer me. I do not want to hear what the SFPA thinks or what the task force thinks. Who is the task force made up of? As a committee, can we find out who the members of the task force are?