Christopher O'Sullivan (Cork South West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I thank our guests for their opening statements and contributions. I recently visited Union Hall, having been invited to the pier to witness at first hand how the fish is weighed, brought to the plant and processed. The staff carefully talked and walked me through the process as it would be with the control plan in place. Union Hall, as our guests will be aware, deals mainly with smaller whitefish boats. The boxes of fish, which are already iced, are hoisted directly into the back of a lorry and brought straight to the processing plant, which is only a couple of hundred metres away. If I am not doing it justice, it is because I was walked through the process only once, but our guests will get the point. The fish is brought straight to the plant, de-iced, weighed accurately with transparency and full traceability, boxed, labelled and put into the back of a truck to be distributed wherever its intended market is. To me, that makes complete sense. It is safe, transparent and traceable.

I was then walked through what the process will be following the removal of the control plan and the weighing of the fish on the pier at Union Hall. These whitefish boats can carry anywhere between ten and 15 different species, or even more. The idea of the sampling plans will not work in those cases because it could be five boxes of one species, and eight, three and 12 of others, so it simply will not work. Without the control plan, the boxes of fish are iced, landed on the pier, de-iced, weighed, re-iced and put back into a lorry to be transported to the plant, which is only a couple of hundred metres away.

You can see straight away that makes no sense. It will lead to health and safety issues, as was mentioned, because more time will be spent on the pier exposed to the elements. There may, unfortunately, be an issue with the quality of the fish. We pride ourselves on the incredible fresh quality of our fish, but if the control plan is removed and it is weighed on the pier and exposed to the elements, such as bright sunshine on a hot day, that will have a very significant impact. The key to our fishing sector and the pride we have in the quality of our fish is getting it to market quickly. This will slow down that process by hours. It makes no sense.

Do our guests accept that in the instance I have just described at Union Hall, where there is a variety of species of whitefish, weighing the fish on the pier simply will not work because of the lack of infrastructure on most of our piers and the fact that, in most cases, the processing plants are located various distances from the pier? Do they accept that what is being forced on the fishing sector with the withdrawal of the control plan cannot work in most instances?

Dr. Steele asked how we got to this point. I will read out a passage from the opening statement from the Irish Fish Processors and Exporters Association to be presented to the committee at our next meeting. It states:

A subsequent Administrative Inquiry was required by the EU Commission to be carried out. The SFPA undertook this inquiry during 2019. Again no input was sought from us as a sector.

Does the SFPA accept, therefore, that the reason we are here relates to a consistent lack of consultation with the sector and industry?

Will the SFPA commit to making every effort, in full consultation with the industry, to bring back a control plan with in-factory weighing? As is the case in instances such as at Union Hall, it is fully traceable and transparent and much more efficient. Dr. Steele said she will examine the reintroduction of a control plan and in-factory weighing for the shellfish and whitefish industries. Is there a timeline for when that might happen?

In cases such as that which I described, processors simply do not have the equipment to hand for on-pier weighing. What will be done in the interim?