Eamon Ryan (Dublin South, Green Party)

Under the Fisheries Acts, primary responsibility for the management, conservation, protection and development of inland fisheries stocks rests with the Central Fisheries Board and the relevant regional fisheries boards. I remind Deputy Sheahan that the South Western Regional Fisheries Board — not the Central Fisheries Board — is responsible for the fisheries in the Cork and Kerry fishery districts. The Kerry district includes Cromane Bay, which was referred to by the Deputy. I assume he was speaking about the location where the sea comes into Castlemaine Harbour at Dingle Bay, County Kerry. My function in the management of wild salmon fishery is to introduce the wild salmon and sea trout tagging scheme regulations that specify, inter alia, which rivers have a harvestable surplus according to the management and scientific advice. I have signed an array of salmon conservation by-laws determining the conditions under which wild salmon can be harvested during the season.

On 23 April 2008, the South Western Regional Fisheries Board circulated proposals on how it intended to manage the Kerry fishery district in 2008. It was indicated that the fishery in Castlemaine Harbour should be opened on a restricted basis, with special conditions that included an obligation on fishermen to provide scale samples of all fish caught for analysis to determine the river stock to which they belong. Since 2006, the Government's policy has been to adhere to the scientific advice and to manage for conservation rather than for catch. In that context, when I received the board's proposals, I sought the advice of the standing scientific committee of the National Salmon Commission. The scientific advice I received, generally speaking, is that the harvest of fish should be contained to estuaries and rivers which are meeting their conservation limits. In the case of bays into which two or more rivers flow, the standing scientific committee, in specifying the available surplus for harvest, requires that all rivers meet their conservation limits. If it is the case that harvest is going to take place on the mixed stock, an appropriate reduction of the available surplus is made. The Maine and Behy rivers, two of the rivers that flow into Castlemaine Harbour, are not meeting their conservation limits.

I am mindful of the advice of the standing scientific committee that mixed stock fisheries pose a particular threat to the attainment of conservation limits in all rivers. In this regard, a fishery operating in Castlemaine Harbour outside of the river estuaries must be considered a mixed stock fishery as it is potentially exploiting fish from each of the rivers which flow into the harbour. I advised the board that I did not regard the arrangements, which were identified as being in accordance with the Government decision on the management of the fishery, to be in compliance with the scientific advice. The prosecution of a fishery in the common estuary of Castlemaine Harbour is not provided for in schedule 4 of the wild salmon and sea trout tagging scheme regulations. In interpreting the regulations, it is my view that the precautionary principle must be adhered to. Therefore, no harvest of fish should compromise stocks which are identified as failing to meet conservation limits.

It is vital to afford every protection to the remaining salmon stocks and to clearly prioritise conservation over catch. We must fulfil our obligation under the habitats directive to maintain or restore fish stocks to favourable conservation status. To add further legal clarity to the matter, I introduced by-law No. 832 of 2008 which prohibits the taking of salmon and trout by all means, including draft net, rod and line, in the waters of Castlemaine Harbour, the common estuary of the Behy, Caragh, Laune and Maine rivers, between Inch and Rosbehy points. Any delay in restoring the commercial fishery can only assist in the recovery of those stocks which are not meeting their conservation limits, thereby providing the opportunity for a sustainable fishery in the future. I have asked the South Western Regional Fisheries Board to ensure that appropriate surveys are repeated to the satisfaction of the scientists to establish with certainty the status of stocks in the Behy and Maine rivers.

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