Mr. Francis O'Donnell:

The Irish Fish Producers Organisation, IFPO, would like to take this opportunity to thank Chairman and the committee for the opportunity to make this submission on the Island Fisheries (Heritage Licence) Bill 2017. This submission is short in nature reflecting the consensus of my organisation.

The IFPO was established in 1975 as the first Irish fish producer, and represents 44 Irish-registered fishing vessels. Those vessels range from small inshore vessels to the larger refrigerated salt water, RSW, vessels. Our members are dispersed nationally in that we have members located around the entire coast, some of who hail from, and are still living on, various coastal Islands. We have discussed at length the Island Fisheries (Heritage Licence) Bill and, in particular, we have asked members for their views on same. The consensus is that such a licence would be discriminatory in nature. Persons engaged in inshore fishing who are resident on an island or on the mainland have the same access to fishing opportunities at present. To alter this in any way could be putting a fisherman or woman resident in Burtonport, for example, at a disadvantage over a fisherman or woman living on Arranmore Island, one mile away. This same scenario exists around the entire coast.

We have a plethora of policy directives around various fisheries to do with track record. The inshore fishing industry is currently very well represented by the National Inshore Fisheries Forum, NIFF, which lobbies and argues on behalf of the wider inshore sector.

To afford exclusive rights or otherwise by way of a heritage licence would destabilise the inshore sector's ability to lobby as a coherent cohort within the wider fishing industry and would, in our opinion, cause fragmentation and infighting.

There is a strongly held view among IFPO members who come from or currently live on islands that the drive to obtain a heritage licence may allow access to commercial fishing for Atlantic salmon in the future. This fishery has been closed to drift netting since 2006. The IFPO holds the view that if this fishery reopens, all inshore vessels should be able to enter this fishery and not just those of island residents.

The IFPO cannot support the Bill, as it is our strongly held opinion that it discriminates and goes against Government policy, which aims at managing all fisheries resources in a fair and transparent way. We have always been extremely supportive of inshore fisheries but we do not see a difference between somebody living on an island and somebody living a mile away on the mainland. We would like to see inshore fishers getting a very fair deal on the exploitation of resources and quota. At present, 450 tonnes of mackerel are allocated to line caught fishing. On average, only 250 tonnes of this is taken up every year. I am not saying there should be more or less, but it is not being exploited fully. We have a strong view on it. We are certainly not against inshore fishers. Many people in the room know the IFPO has done many road trips over the past five or six years arguing that inshore fishers should be better represented. We believe all inshore fishers should be represented fairly and in the same way. If a particular heritage licence affords rights or extra fishing opportunities to one person while denying them to someone else living a mile away, it will be a big problem. I thank the committee for listening.