Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)

I will try to respond to that profound comment at the end. As I have only five minutes, I wish to concentrate on the job at hand which is to get the best deal possible from the existing document on the table. I agree with Deputy Pringle that the idea that we sold out fishing to get a good deal on farming is totally inaccurate. Ireland's deal on farming is no better or worse than that of other European countries. That is evidenced in our Common Agricultural Policy discussions at the moment. We have looked at the countries that have traditionally done well out of the Common Agricultural Policy and the countries that have not done well. Ireland is right on the average. This idea that we got some great deal for farmers but sold fishing down the drain is wrong - the two are not connected. It is true that we persuaded people to vote in favour of EEC membership on the basis of payments to farmers. The historical discussions on fishing are just that, historical discussions. However, I need to deal with the realities of political negotiation to get the best possible deal to ensure we have a fishing industry in five or ten years' time.

Some of the commentary here has been inaccurate. The Irish fishing industry is not dying on its feet. Last year Irish fishing industry exports grew by 15%. There are 2,095 boats in the Irish fishing fleet employing 5,000 people. Some 175 processing companies employ almost 3,000 people and a further 1,500 people are employed in ancillary services to the fishing industry. While we want to employ considerably more people than that, we have a good base from which to work. We have had consolidation of fleet as the Irish fleet has grown in terms of the trawler size and efficiency of catch. If we did not have that we would have many more boats. We also had some extremely wealthy people in the Irish fishing industry, in the pelagic sector in particular where there are 23 boats.

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