John Brady (Wicklow, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome Mr. Gaffney, his dad and the rest of the witnesses here this afternoon. I know Mr. Gaffney and his dad. I have been trying to push this case in recent years. In the last line of his opening statement, he said that we were the last chance of ending this nightmare. That sums it up. It has been a nightmare personally for the whole family. I know the personal toll it has had in recent years. It is highly frustrating because a solution is being offered to this whole saga and I will come to that in a couple of minutes.

Senator Craughwell outlined the core issues here. I wish to home in on a couple of points there. All the paperwork had been signed off.

The German Marine Survey Office, MSO, had done all the paperwork that was there. Mr. Pinkster outlined the process that was in place around the sister ships. Perhaps we could get a little bit more information about the time when a ship is built before that certification is done. Will Mr. Pinkster paint the picture of what exactly a ship has to go through before that? Are individual tests carried out on all of the ships? This trawler had an additional 20 tonnes and at what point should that be picked up in that process?