Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Chairman for giving me the opportunity to say a few words about what is happening today regarding this and other amendments. All the committee's amendments are being ruled out of order and are not being entertained. That is very sad and very bad.

It is on record that it was the UK that first taught coastal communities how to fish back in the 1600s. Since then, Irish fishermen have developed, modernised and kept coastal communities going through the years, decades and centuries. Fishing has provided a living, sometimes part time and more often full time, all along our coasts. All we can seem to offer fishermen now is to decommission them. The Government is saying it can pay fishermen to cease and give up, but who will replace their income and employment in coastal communities? This will have a devastating effect, for evermore, on those communities that depend so much on fishing for their livelihoods, whether it is the small shop, chemist, bed and breakfast or whatever, which all benefit in some small way.

We are closing down one of the only things we have. It is the same as closing down Bord na Móna. This Government is closing down all the things we have and are good at; that will be its record. The sad thing about it is that it is not just Fine Gael or Fianna Fáil individually but both of them together. This is what is happening. Every day we see that the only racket about fishing now is between the French and the UK. That is where the fight is because they have something to fight about. We have nothing to fight about except for the Government turning on our people and our own flesh and blood, who are trying to operate, do their jobs, earn a living and employ people. All we do and all we offer is to decommission them. We then further penalise them with penalty points.

I very much appreciate, from the bottom of my heart, what Pat The Cope Gallagher tried to do. He was of the Fianna Fáil Party, but he got us to rescind the penalty points only a few months ago. He left the Leas-Cheann Comhairle's chair, went to the back benches and put forward a Bill, which we all voted for, including Fianna Fáil members who are voting for this penalty points system now. They all voted to rescind that statutory instrument and now we are bringing it forward again.