Martin Ferris (Kerry North, Sinn Fein)
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At 10 a.m. on 27 May 2005, the Celtic Sun, vessel T160, left Fenit on a fishing voyage. On board was skipper John Moriarty and his brother Billy Moriarty. At 1.30 p.m. the Naval Service vessel LE Emer called on the Celtic Sun to cut its engines as it wished to conduct a routine boarding. Both vessels were located eight miles south-west of Loop Head, at 52° 32' north, 10° 10' west. The boarding officer from the LE Emer was D. Tighe, who was accompanied by a female officer.

The naval officers requested the fishing vessel's logbook. The skipper, John Moriarty, informed them that as he was on a voyage of less than 24 hours, it was not necessary to have a logbook on board. The officer said he would not accept this and that he would accompany the crew of the fishing vessel ashore. The crew asked permission to shoot the nets and to go ashore to speak with the regional officer of the Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources for the area. This was not accepted so they contacted a fisheries inspectorate officer, Kevin Flannery from Dingle, by mobile telephone and asked him to clarify the situation. They lost contact on the telephone but, working through the Valentia lifeboat service VHF radio, in the company of the naval officer, they again made contact with the inspector, Mr. Flannery. Mr. Flannery relayed to both the skipper and the naval officer that it is not necessary to have a logbook on board if the voyage is of less than 24 hours' duration.

The regulation concerning log books when fishing in Community waters states:

Masters of all fishing vessels more than 10 metres in length shall keep a logbook.

This rule shall not apply to vessels of more than 10 metres but not more than 17 metres in length on a fishing voyage of a maximum of 24 hours measured from the time of leaving port to the time of returning to port.

The length of the Celtic Sun is 11.95 m. It is clear, given the regulations governing fishing in Community waters, that the vessel was fishing legally and the information relayed to the naval officer by the fishing inspector was correct. A warning was issued to the crew at 2.22 p.m. in respect of them not having a log book, they were ordered to go ashore and were accompanied as far as Kerry Head. They met the fishing officer with whom I spoke on the phone. He confirmed the details I have read out.

The crew lost a day's fishing as a result of this, and it was their only day's fishing that week. They have only had three days' fishing in the past four weeks. Notwithstanding the running costs of getting to the fishing grounds, they then had to come straight back. Many other vessels of the same length, or between 10 m and 14 m, on one-day fishing trips of less than 24 hours are similarly affected. The matter must be clarified. The Departments of Defence and Communications, Marine and Natural Resources are in conflict regarding interpretation of the rules. I thank the Minister of State for listening.

Tom Kitt (Dublin South, Fianna Fail)
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I thank Deputy Ferris for raising the matter. I will outline my Department's position on it.

The State's fishery protection capability, as provided by the Department of Defence on behalf of the Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources which has policy responsibility for sea fisheries protection, is delivered by the Naval Service with assistance from the Air Corps.

The main day-to-day role of the Naval Service is to provide a fishery protection service in accordance with the State's obligations as a member of the European Union. The service is tasked with patrolling all Irish waters from the shoreline to the outer limits of the exclusive fishery limit, which covers an area of 132,000 square miles. These patrols are carried out on a regular basis and are directed to all areas of Irish waters as necessary. Fishery protection activity accounts for more than 90% of all Naval Service patrol time.

The operational targeting of the protection effort is co-ordinated with the Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources in accordance with procedures set down in the service level agreement between the Departments. Such targeting takes account of previous history of fishing, infringements, sightings, fishing zones, closed areas and species and allocated quotas amongst other matters. A comprehensive process is in place to identify and agree patrol plans and inspection targets. The objective in all cases is the protection of the fishing assets of the State.

With regard to the incident referred to by Deputy Ferris involving the fishing vessel Celtic Sun, on Friday, 27 May 2005 Naval Service officers from the LE Emer boarded the Celtic Sun some six miles off the Clare coast and carried out a routine inspection of the vessel. It was found not to be carrying an EU logbook, which is a requirement under national and European Union legislation for all fishing vessels of more than 10 m in length. The Naval Service did not detain the vessel. The skipper was issued with a written warning and required to depart the fishing grounds and return to port to obtain an EU logbook.

There is no undue concentration by the Naval Service on fishery control in terms of the Irish fishing effort within Irish territorial waters. Obviously in numerical terms the Naval Service inspects more Irish than non-Irish vessels because there are more Irish vessels in our patrol area. However, over the past three years statistics show that the percentage of non-Irish vessels in the patrol area boarded and inspected by the Naval Service is greater than the percentage of Irish vessels so inspected. In 2004, Irish vessels accounted for 50% of vessels sighted in the patrol area but only 44% of boardings and inspections.

The overall objective Irish seas fisheries and monitoring, surveillance and control is to ensure the highest possible level of compliance by all fishing vessels with the requirement of international, EU and national fisheries law. The Department of Defence, Naval Service and Air Corps will continue to work in partnership with the Department of Communications, Marine and Natural Resources in this regard. Co-operation with other member states will also continue to be pursued in the interests of effective monitoring, surveillance and control of all fishing activity in a consistent and co-ordinated manner across the EU.

I thank Deputy Ferris for raising this matter. We always deal with these issues late in the day. That is the official response to the matter and if he wishes to raise any other issues in the near future he should feel free to contact me.