Ms Teresa Morrissey:

I will let Mr. O'Sullivan in after me. There is a difference between shellfish and finfish applications. In the finfish sector, there are requirements which are not present in the shellfish sector. Those requirements are around our environmental obligations under the habitats and birds directive. Applicants for a marine finfish licence are required to do an environmental impact assessment. That has to be appropriately assessed by the Marine Institute and the applicant needs a Natura impact statement. The environmental impact assessment is a huge body of work. As Ms McManus will attest, it takes many years.

On what we were lacking, Deputy Gallagher mentioned it in terms of engagement. A person applying for planning permission for a house would have engagement with the local authority or the Planning Authority in advance of sending in such a large application. That did not happen in the case of these licence applications. As a result, there were gaps in terms of what was required in environmental impact assessment, despite asking numerous times what would be required and what they would want to see in an environmental impact assessment for a marine finfish licence. We got no guidance from the regulatory body, which is the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine. We have moved on from that. Those assessments have been done and submitted to the Department. They are in the process of being assessed by the Marine Institute, as the scientific advisers, and then they will undergo public and statutory consultation at the same time.

In terms of addressing the bottleneck that the Cathaoirleach mentioned, yes, there is a bottleneck in terms of the Marine Institute carrying out appropriate assessments for both finfish and shellfish. For a shellfish application, there is no requirement to have an environmental impact assessment. However, appropriate assessments are carried out on a bay-wide basis for any licence that is either within or adjacent to an SAC or an SPA, which is actually the majority of our licences. While there is a bottleneck there, if it was addressed on its own, there would be another one down the line as there is a bit of over and back between Department and the Marine Institute in assessing what the latter has assessed, comments and things like that. There are bottlenecks throughout the whole system. Resources would address it, but they would have to be put in at every stage of the entire system.

The Cathaoirleach asked about engagement with the Department on the draft heads of the Bill. We have had engagement with the Department over the past two years, I would say, regarding those draft heads. Our understanding is that they are only to address section 19A(4), which is a provision in our current legislation that allows us to be operational while awaiting licence renewal. We have the privilege of enjoying our current licence conditions while waiting for that process to be renewed. Thankfully we have that; we would not be able to operate without it as we are waiting 15 or 20 years for those licences to be renewed. My understanding is that the draft heads of the Bill are going to address just that and that they will also contain some amendments that are required to deal with ALAB.