Thomas Pringle (Donegal South West, Independent)
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My apologies for not being here for the presentation, but I have read the document. I echo the comments of previous speakers on the lack of political will on the part of every Government to deal with the historical wrongs done to Ireland in the context of our fishing rights. It is interesting that prior to Ireland joining the EEC, the Commission gave itself sole responsibility for the conservation of fish stocks in European waters in the full knowledge that Ireland, England and Denmark were negotiating to join at the time. The European Economic Community, as it was then known, set out to steal the resources from us and hamstring us in negotiations that would take place after we had joined. The result has been enshrined in the EU treaties since. We have always been playing catch-up in trying to undo something that was enshrined in EU law before we joined the European Union. I realise it is not the responsibility of the officials present. It is a political role. Unfortunately, this and previous Governments have not attempted to take this on and try to redress some of the wrongs done. That has led to the Hague preferences and the fact that we cannot even have them enshrined in the Common Fisheries Policy. We will have to continuously use up political and negotiating capital every year to ensure the Hague preferences are enshrined in negotiations. That leads to huge difficulties, whereby we cannot concentrate on other issues of importance to coastal and fishing communities.

The agreement on discards is welcome. However, much will depend on the actual technicalities of how the measure will be implemented and what structures will be put in place in order that fishermen will be supported in getting alternative gear that will let juvenile fish go. However, there might still be a by-catch. It is vital that fishermen not be penalised if, in implementing the measures introduced under the CFP, they still have a by-catch that will have to be landed. This should be looked on in a favourable way if somebody is participating and doing his or her best to reduce the number of discards. That will probably emerge in the detail of how the discard policy will be implemented.

One of the issues raised in the conference last week was regionalisation and how regional decision making was envisaged to take place in the future. In our case, there might be eight or nine countries' fleets operating in our waters and there will be the issue of trying to secure agreement on a regional basis for management structures and so forth and how effectively they will work.

Will the Commission fully support the case if all countries bar one agree conservation or management measures? How quickly will the Commission act to ensure those measures are supported and put in place? That will be important for the management of our waters in future so we should get an outline of the Commission's commitment to dealing with those issues.