Mr. Finian O'Sullivan:

If the Deputy were applying for finfish licence, as I said, we have quoted waiting times of up to 10 or 15 years, so it looks that bad. In our own bay at home, we are in licence renewal since January 2023. We started the process back in the middle of 2022 when we did all the mapping and so forth. We are heading into 2026 now, so the Deputy can figure out how long it is going to take. It is just frustrating. I often say at this stage to the Department that our mussels will grow fine without any licence. There was no regulation really when we started way back in the 1980s. The amended Act came afterwards and the whole business had to be regulated, and it got regulated and everyone was compliant with that. However, what happens then in the vacuum of licences being issued is that we have people drifting towards non-compliance. We could find very quickly that the industry - there are roles in this industry, and we do not know either; I am only speculating - becomes unregulated to a degree, and that is not a good place to be for the industry or for the State. The timeline for waiting is like asking "How long is a piece of string?" in the present structure.