Michael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

A huge number of anglers have come to Ireland through the years. The sport has been worth something in the region of €86 million to this country, but unfortunately we have lost many of those anglers. We will hear many people blame the farmers for it, but the reality is that raw sewage is going into many rivers throughout the country and that is depleting fish stocks. There are major problems in some areas. It is sickening. I have seen it over the past week or two in Lough Talt in Sligo. Water has been taken out by Sligo County Council for forty years. A submission has been made which means that the water may have to stop coming out of it. That is not good and it does not bring people along.

The Bill talks about increasing fines. Working with people is how problems are solved. This State seems to think that if we continue to fine people more, they will stop doing this, that and the other. That is not how it is done. We should work with people, because at the end of the day it does not matter how many officers are working in a particular place. If communities are not working with us, we will never succeed in any walk of life. That is very important.

One year ago we saw dramatic flooding in the west.

I and other Deputies saw the frustration people were going through in our areas and when the water had drifted away, many councils tried to do remedial works so that it would not happen again. The rigmarole and paperwork one has to go through to get these jobs done cost time and money and the attitude of officials has to change. It was sickening to see a machine stopped for two weeks recently. One can give out about a council but they were trying to solve problems and I knew the man who was trying to get the work done.

Down through the years, we cleaned rivers and drains and the fish came back but we cannot touch anything now. Near Lanesborough, one side of the river could be done but bushes had to be left up on the other side and a bit of common sense is needed, rather than relying on people who went to college and got a title as na leabhar so that they could go and tell local stakeholders how to manage their lands. These people have done it for years and looked after it well and one could learn more from them.

The farming community is blamed for everything but are the keepers of our countryside so it is very frustrating. So-called environmentalists tell us how to do things from a distance, as in the song by Nanci Griffith, but they might not know the ground while the locals do. If we make a mistake on our lands it costs us in our pocket but if an official makes a mistake it is the taxpayers who pay for it. It is very important that we work with communities and we should not always be quick to say people cannot do this that or the other. Work has to be done to take preventative actions and there are trees lying across the Shannon and the Suck. I have worked around the country and met some great people in fisheries who had common sense. If they are near a river they put a bale of straw down, put in place a filtering system and do the paperwork later, without stopping the machine. In certain counties, however, there are new kids on the block who think that, with a flashy badge, they have the power to do what they want and they use them to stop works, creating friction in communities. A good working relationship is needed with a bit of cop on from officials. They should work with people and cut out a lot of the paperwork, the reams of paperwork comprising method statements, details of how to do this, that or the other, and the reasons that people cannot sink this or that. They made rivers years ago when there were no rivers in the country and the fish came back.

There are also problems in some lakes in keeping the stocking rate up, such as in Ballinlough. We need to make sure we give people in small towns in rural isolated areas the opportunity to fish for recreational purposes or to attract tourists. The Minister of State is from the west and knows how dependent some areas are on a few people coming to visit. There has to be a balance and I do not say we allow people to do everything willy-nilly, but we tend to go in with a heavy hand. We flash the badge and quote this or that regulation to frighten people but if one pulls a dog's tail too often they will bite back and that is what will happen around the country. Many people were very discommoded by the flooding and put up with a lot of torture and hassle. There were dead fish who were being picked by the swans but the farmer got the blame again. We need to get away from reflex reactions and blaming the people who keep the land because if they are not on board we will go nowhere. I ask officials to work with people rather than adopting a bullish attitude in saying how things should be done.

We need to look at the loss of fish and many people have been left high and dry since the eel fishing ban came in. I have talked to small operators in different counties and there was to be a Government review and report on the issue but it has gone dead in the water and, once again, the ordinary guy has been blamed for the depletion of stocks. It would be a fair eel which would come up the River Shannon at the point where the electricity is generated at ArdnaCrusha. We need to look after these people because the eel saga has dragged on for a long time.

We should make a concerted effort, especially in the lake district and along the River Shannon, to bring stocks back and with them the tourists, because if the economy is going better there will be more money to spend on something else and less social welfare to pay out. There is no good doing anything if we do not tackle the major problem. I do not blame Irish Water because it has been going on for years and years in Connemara, in my own county, in Mayo and right around the country. The EPA does lovely reports on how this and that are wrong and there will then be a reasoned opinion from our lovely buddies in Europe and a warning that they will fine us if we do not do this, that or the other, and I accept that one needs money for much of this stuff.

I know of a lake into which raw sewage is going and Irish Water wants to solve the problem. We can treat 99% of the water but an outflow licence will not be given. Instead, people are told the sewage has to be piped for 7 km. The person who came up with that has no concept of what it costs or the consequences, because we now face the major problem of letting water out onto groundwater. Raw sewage is still going into the same lake today but the company that can treat it, up to 99%, will not be listened to. We need to home in on this type of problem because doing so, and showing a bit of cop on, will save money and be good for the environment. No one can guarantee to solve 100% of anything but if we can get 99% the EPA should be very happy as compared with having 0%. There needs to be joined-up thinking involving the Department and the likes of the EPA. When someone puts a good proposal together they should be allowed to work with it. In Sligo, 10,000 people are relying on a water pipe being put in but because it is an SAC, about which the Minister of State will know a lot from Connemara, they will not be given an extraction licence. It is very easy to give out about a council or An Bord Pleanála but the EIAs and appropriate screenings are done. One would not want to go through IROPI because it is a four-year process.

The Department of Communications, Climate Action and Environment has advised councils not to go down that road because it is a never-ending journey. We need someone to point out to the authorities in Europe that we are doing the best we can and we need to get this sorted. At the end of the day human health is more important than anything, irrespective of the environmental issues.

I know the Minister of State is a fairly sensible person. Trying to punish people with heavier fines and trying to frighten the daylights out of ordinary people around the countryside with flashing badges, etc., is not helpful. Those people should work with communities. If the farmer wants to take out the bush on the other side of the river to make it better, it will not damage the fish. There is no point in saying that, because the bush will not be in the water. If they want to clean a river, they should be able to do so without any of the codswallop that goes on and filling in reams of paperwork. At the end of the day a farmer is a farmer; he is not trained to be completing reams of paperwork.

Mistakes have been made. I was down there with Deputy Calleary one day looking at the flooding. Some years ago some genius decided to fill with concrete some of the crevices that were heading over to the lake. It ended up that it caused some of the flooding in his town. We need to think. Some of these things are there for reasons. One would learn more talking to the oldest person in a village than spending a year in Trinity College. They know the lie of their land. There is no point in me talking about it. If I go down, as I did with Deputy Calleary one day, I can look but at the end of the day someone in that area knows every nook and cranny, just as the Ceann Comhairle would in Kildare. We need to listen to people rather than claiming to know more than them because of what is on a piece of paper. These are the mistakes that have caused problems. Unfortunately, no one pays the price for that. Ordinary farmers will pay the price because if it affects their land it will cost them to put it right again.

I acknowledge the Minister of State is doing his best in his job and I am not criticising him. However, I have a major problem with the way some of these people go about their business. I do not accept the way they try to frighten people. In one part of Roscommon last year, there was míle murder about whether a machine was stopped. Consider a person, whose house had nearly been flooded and who could not leave it for a week or two, being told by a whippersnapper flashing a badge that he or she could not move the water. No matter how cool that person might be, he or she would get a bit blunt and excited about it.

Culverts need to be put in. We have had endless reports. A person coming from a particular area will know everything about it. They know they can do a job one way and can do right. They do not have to fill in heaps of paperwork. They do not need a consultant with 40 letters after his name charging an arm and a leg telling them how to do it when at the end of the day it could be the greatest disaster ever. The Minister of State should try to work with people in the different areas around the country.

All Deputies agree that we need to try to increase the fish stocks. We need a more common-sense approach to working with people. It would be better for the environment if we do that. It would be better for Inland Fisheries Ireland and a less troublesome life for the farmers and the people who live in rural areas.

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