Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am delighted to speak on the Bill. Its purpose is to confer an explicit power on Inland Fisheries Ireland, IFI, to bring and prosecute summary proceedings for inland fishery offences. IFI is the State agency responsible for the protection, conservation, development and promotion of Ireland's inland fisheries and sea angling resources. It was established on 1 July 2010 - I was a member of the Committee on Communications, Energy and Natural Resources at the time - following the amalgamation of the Central Fisheries Board and the seven regional fisheries boards into a single agency.

I do not believe it has acquitted itself well or that proper thought and processes were put into it. Our system has failed us. I compliment Deputy Penrose on and salute for his service in the House, not only from a legal point of view but also as a Deputy. I congratulate him on what he did for carers. He also recognised the role of the Leas-Cheann Comhairle, who was a Minister at the time. It was a common-sense approach. Sadly, however, common sense has gone out the window in everything in this country.

I have a question for the Minister of State. I ask him to note it and to get his secretary or somebody in the Department to refer back to me on it. People have been prosecuted in this country and now we are rushing a Bill through, after the fact, to ensure the prosecutions stand. That is an outrage. Our law was not up to it and they should not have been prosecuted. As Deputy Penrose said, and he has a legal brain and is a qualified man, if they were prosecuted and did not appeal it, they are being told "tough" by the State. That is a travesty. That is not the justice for which the people of 1916 fought. It is disgraceful.

I know some of these people in my county. When I found out about this from the Minister, Deputy Naughten, I told one fellow that he should not have been summonsed. He told me he had pleaded guilty as he was sick of going to court. He was hauled before the court on three days because he was taking timber out of a river that could have washed away the N24 at Kilshane and Bansha in Tipperary when the flood occurred a couple of months later. It is what every farmer has always done - mind the rivers, take out the surplus timber and clean the bridges. Now, they cannot look at them because there are fellows going around in shiny shoes with briefcases who are flashing badges. They are like terrorists. They are terrorising farmers and ordinary people. It is not good enough. They must be reined in.

I sat on the committee that appointed the IFI board. I and two former colleagues, former Deputies Noel Coonan and Peter Kelly, were privileged to be appointed as three lay members to interview the applicants. Deputy Eamon Ryan, who was Minister at the time, brought in an initiative whereby three board members would be appointed by the communities. I volunteered for it and got the job. We arrived at the Public Appointments Service office in O'Connell Street to pick the people. We were given 100 CVs to examine. We were greeted by an official who brought us in, gave us tea and said, "Gentlemen, you would not be able to look at them as you have so much to do, so I picked the first 20." I was appointed the chairperson of the interview board. I said, "Have you now, madam? Thank you." I turned the CVs upside down and I started reading from the other side. She was horrified. We called for a break and she went down to have tea. There were dozens of officials there, such as retired county managers and retired senior civil servants. It was the cosy club. They protect everything. She was going around whispering in people's ears, "This fellow should not be here at all. He is upsetting the apple cart. He will not take the names I gave him." When I looked at the names they were all retired chief superintendents, retired chief fire officers and retired senior officials in the county council. Deputy Penrose mentioned the name of a lady earlier. Her name was added.

She was taboo. She was a community person who had more in the back of her brain than all of the officials had together. She could not be on the board. She would be dangerous because she knew something about the industry and its troubles. Retired officials in receipt of pensions and big pay-outs were going to tell us what to do. They were hand-picked. It was decided to start at the bottom and pick three good people, who served their time. They were from the industry and involved in fishing clubs and preservation work, rather than officials who were paid to travel everywhere and who would be promoted having secured prosecutions. We have lost our way and it is a downright disgrace.

People have been prosecuted under the board which succeeded the previous board and followed the amalgamation of the seven regional fisheries boards. The Minister of State is standing over that. He is happy to pass the Bill. People were falsely convicted. That is not democracy; it is like something that would happen in a junta in Africa. Ordinary people were doing good. I do not cover up for anybody.

Deputy Wallace has left the Chamber, but I challenge utterly what he said. He gave a bad name to the farmers of Ireland. They and the farming organisations have made huge efforts in the negotiations and training that took place. There were bad practices in the past, but they have been wiped out. Deputy Wallace referred to the pollution caused by farmers and the damage to rivers and fish. He claimed that there were not enough inspections and wanted to know how many unannounced inspections had taken place. There are plenty of unannounced inspections from boys and girls who have nothing else to do but clock up mileage on their cars travelling from Athlone to Tipperary and Tipperary to Galway. It is farcical. The lunatics are in charge of the asylum and ordinary people are being prosecuted.

Fishing clubs in many places in Tipperary do tremendous work stocking the rivers, minding their areas, looking after flora and fauna and providing proper fishing facilities. I could not call some people anything better than terrorists because they are not there to assist but to prosecute. It is bad enough being prosecuted when they have the law on their side, but we have found out they do not have the law on their side. We have to introduce a Bill. I am disappointed with the Minister of State, Deputy Kyne, and the Minister, Deputy Naughten, for proposing this.

As Deputy Penrose said, those who were fined should be paid back and compensated for their many trips to the courts. They should be compensated for their good names being besmirched on local media and having been identified as being prosecuted. They should be supported and given prizes for protecting bridges and other infrastructure that would have been swept away by trees and everything else that came down the rivers.

This is outrageous. I note the Minister of State's officials are whispering to each other. I hope they are taking note of what I am saying. I am not anti-official, but they know precious little about the industry. That has been proved by what Deputy Penrose, who has been in the House a lot longer than I have, said. He outlined what happened to the Royal Canal, whereby there was a proposal to build a motorway on it. Power has gone to the heads of officials. They are punch drunk with power across a plethora of Government agencies. Farmers and ordinary people who are building are affected. No banker was prosecuted. There is a cosy elite and the minions, who worked, paid taxes, educated themselves and provided community facilities are prosecuted.

Others cannot drain so much as a teacup or eggcup of water from the rivers that are flooding their houses because so many agencies have to be consulted. They are told they cannot do this or that. The Minister, Deputy Ross, gave us €1 million to pitch a bridge in Ardfinnan. The project has being going on for two years and now crayfish has been found, following three or four consultants' reports. The consultants should be sacked and forced to repay the money they were paid. Why were the crayfish not found two years ago? We have money for the project but there is a punitive one-way system on an old bridge, which is a lovely protected structure.

The first consultant's report, on which €60,000 was spent, was published two years after the bridge had been damaged. A second consultant's report was sent to the Department in order to secure the money, but it cannot be spent because crayfish were found under the river. Archaeologists and other specialists from abroad now have to examine the area. It is a case of, "You scratch my back, I'll scratch yours" when it comes to hiring consultants. The system is sick and stinks to high heaven. It is corrupt in the extreme. The people in Ardfinnan will be told to go to hell and that the money is being taken back because the bridge cannot be fixed due to crayfish. I am as interested in fish species as anybody else, but as I said at a public meeting there are a lot of Bray families in Ardfinnan. I never knew there were crays there.

We are being told there are snails in rivers and we cannot touch anything. There are too many people with degrees and doctorates who could not use a shovel, bucket, pump or siphon a glass of water out of a glass. It is disgusting and I hope the Minister of State is listening. I thought he was a country man who represented the islands. This is disgraceful and an abuse of power. People are being prosecuted and fined. The EPA is fining people on the spot.

A farmer in my village was cleaning the banks of a river. He never went near the water, but instead pulled off scrub bushes which, as Deputy Healy Rae will tell the House, one would be prosecuted under the single farm payment for not addressing. The EPA representative flashed a badge and told the farmer if he was brought to court the fine would be €5,000 or €10,000 but if he paid on the spot the fine would be €1,500. It is like Travellers outside of fairs. It is a barter system, whereby people are told to pay up instead of going to court. It is extortion and intimidation. It is disgusting and wrong, no matter what laws we pass.

These people have to be reined in. I talk to the Minister, Deputy Canney, every day. It is difficult to try to drain a river or clean a stream or bridge. The streams and ponds used to be clean. I remember horses and carts and men with shovels cleaning waterways, and then when diggers came along they were used. Now excavators are used. We have all the equipment in the world, but we cannot touch rivers and streams.

My town, Clonmel, spent €15 million on a successful drainage scheme for 15 houses that have not yet been saved. That is futile if we do not clean the river because all of the dirt, moss and dust is washed into gullies and into sewerage pipes and rivers. The rivers are rising every year and we have spent money on building large walls which spoil the views and many other amenities. It is all a folly because ecologists and others tell us what we cannot do. Farmers are ready, willing and able to act. They can take off topsoil, drain rivers to three or four feet and then put back the topsoil. The land will be fine and the rivers will be deepened. The rivers in Clonmel and elsewhere will have to be deepened.

When all of the whizzkids are sacked or retire on large pensions they will be working for others in private consultancies. They set up systems before they leave and create consultancy agencies with people they gave money and contracts to. They line them up to give them consultancy work. The system is rotten, stinks and is disgraceful. The rivers cannot be touched, but they must be cleaned.

The Government does not mind that people's houses are being flooded and will relocate some of the people affected, but will not clean the rivers. The rivers were cleaned years ago and the fish were not poisoned. Many good people worked in the fisheries industry. They mean well, but there is now red tape, bureaucracy and sheer contempt for ordinary people in officialdom. Officials are flashing badges at people, as is the case with An Garda Síochána in many counties because of all of the bad press. People cannot walk in certain areas. It is all law and no fairness.

I am not in favour of breaking the law, but these laws are ridiculous. I told the Minister of State about the corrupt nature of the public appointments board, how I challenged it and what happened. I have anecdotal evidence and the Minister of State can contact the former Deputies I mentioned. It was a charade.

Ordinary people who decided they would avail of the opportunity to be on the board submitted their CVs, which were excellent. Their teeth and nails were worn from kneeling down and working on tidy towns projects, cleaning rivers and other things, but nobody from the fishing industry was appointed. The list was turned upside down and those appointed were selected by a senior official. A cosy cartel has brought this country to ruin. We cannot afford it. There is a furore at the moment that maybe their is a threat to their pensions. Why should there not be a threat to their pensions if they do not earn their pensions? What pensions do ordinary people have?

Suing farmers and bringing them to court is disgraceful and despicable. It is blackguarding and flouting the law, and those involved in it should be held to account. Their names should be printed in newspapers. It is time the Government sat up and listened. I am surprised by the comments of Deputy Wallace because he is from Wexford. He blamed the farmers. I blame Big Phil, the former Minister. He was the monster who decided septic tanks were polluting the country.

The towns and villages, including in my county, are polluting the rivers because raw sewage is flowing into waterways. There is no attenuation and no soak pits; it flows straight into rivers and streams. That is the fault of the Government, county councils and the EPA. The water on the bridge in Newcastle was tested and I asked those involved several times why they did not test the water that was 400 yards away. I told them that was where the outflows from the pipes work, but I was told the water had to be tested at a different place.

Gardaí might have helicopters with them. The county council and public plants are polluting the river. The same happens in Dublin. Millions of euro were spent on a facility in Clonmel. A family made money from fishing eels in the River Suir south of Clonmel to keep the Clonmel Arms going. The water is now crystal clean and there is a new treatment plant which cost €7 million or €8 million. There are no eels or fish in the river. The treatment plants are doing more damage than the pollutants did. That needs to be checked.

They tell us one can drink the water, but I did not. There is no animal or fish life in it. The geniuses with the degrees who would admonish and look down their noses at the ordinary fishing clubs and those who know nature on the ground must be taken out of the place and put out on the ground. Let them take off their shiny shoes and put on wellies, take a shovel and a bucket and look at what is going on. The rivers are rising every day of the week and people are being flooded, yet we have to have a report. When it takes ten agencies to try to dredge a river to save people's homes, we have lost the plot.

The lunatics are continuing to run the asylum and the Minister of State is allowing that. He is a country man, fear an tír. It is a pity that when people like him are appointed to office, they cannot keep back the chaff and assert that they are the bosses and elected by the people. Officials see Ministers as a threat only for the time being because they are the permanent Government with their hands on the handlebars of powers such that one would need a jackhammer or a chisel to get them off. That system has ruined us. It is ruining us in all agencies and all aspects of community life and community spirit. With the rural driving issues now, it is about blaming the lads from the country going home from the pub after a couple of pints for killing everyone. It is a nonsense and they are an easy target. The people of rural Ireland are sick and tired of it. People are playing dirty with them. Rural home owners spend the money on their wells and septic tanks, but the Government is giving those who paid their water bills back all their money. It is a cop-out. I have never seen such a cowardly and inept Government.

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