Mr. Brendan Byrne:

I thank Deputy Maxwell. I want to address one issue, which we should have discussed more, and that is the sampling and weights extrapolation. It affects the processing sector and the catching sector equally. After all the investment the factories did, which was €2.4 million without grant aid, we did all that in good faith hoping it would help us function as a factory as if we were based in Denmark or Sweden. Along comes this weight sampling of 25 kg in a basket, as Deputy Maxwell said, on the pier. Even though we have the state-of-the-art weighing facilities in the factory all renewed and standardised, we are now back to using a basket on the pier of 25 kg. The make up of the contents of that basket is multiplied over the 25 tonnes as contained in the tanker and it determines what fish the boat has. It is not just the weighing of them, it will determine the species extrapolation. It defies any sense that in every factory there is state-of-the-art equipment, standardised across all the factories, under CCTV and recorded for 31 days, but we are doing it with the 25 kg basket. The contents of that 25 kg basket is multiplied over 25 tonnes and determines what the catch is. That impacts the factory. It impacts the three gentlemen here who are representing the catching sector. This is what we are talking about. If the catch composition of that basket is outside the 10% margin of tolerance for any of these gentlemen here, they are in court for a jury trial in criminal proceedings with penalty points to follow. If any sane individual can tell me this is fair or the law then I am all ears. That, however, is the reality of what we are dealing with. You wonder then, as I said in my opening remarks, why 58% less foreign catch lands into this country. They are looking at us. When I go to a conference or a meeting in Brussels they are saying "What are you at and where are you getting these laws?" Other countries have that but they do not do weight extrapolation. Denmark has it and it is not an issue up there. It is a hell of an issue here. The court in Donegal is going to be clogged for the next five years. What is the offence? The offence is that the boat man - let us call him Mr. Byrne - guessed wrong, has given a false guesstimate, and the law of this land states that Mr. Byrne is now before the court for criminal proceedings because he guessed wrong.