Manus Boyle (Fine Gael)

I thank the Minister of State for coming in today and congratulate him on his appointment. It is long overdue. We have been 15 years without a junior Minister and the Government has shown that this is something that is a priority after so many years and that fishing and marine life are back on the agenda. It is great that the Minister of State has come in today, but the people looking in here who are at home in Killybegs and Castletownbere and all around the coast want answers. We have been too long waiting for answers. There are 16,878 people employed in the seafood sector. That makes a critical contribution to our coastal communities. If you had the number of people in the coastal communities all put together in a city working, it would be the biggest talk ever. We have 16,000 people and there is no word of it at all. We do not seem to be on the map at all.

As regards Ireland's marine territory, we have 220 million acres, ten times our land mass. We have some of the richest waters in Europe, exploited, let us be honest, by other member states and third countries that have access to our waters. We have 12% of the EU waters under the CFP and we have only 5.6% of the quota in those waters. Whichever genius made this up, he was not very good at maths anyway. The Irish catch in the EU zone is 15%. Some 85% is taken by non-Irish vessels. Raw material is becoming increasingly uncertain, particularly in reduced quotas like pelagic, mackerel and Dublin Bay prawns. Key species are suffering. I just do not know who we had out doing the Brexit deal. I do not think he was there at all, to agree to a deal like this.

I welcome the engagement and the certainty with the EU and England over the deal and I think it gives the country certainty for the years ahead. It came at a good time, and I thank the Minister of State for that. In the programme for Government, however, the Government took it upon itself to support the sector in addressing these challenges and to support the coastal communities. The CFP is a 40-year-old document and is not fit for purpose. We need to get it reformed, and that has to be one thing that we push very hard. Every time I talk to the Minister of State, he says the same thing: we have to try to get it changed in Europe. I get that, but he has to feel the passion coming from the people in the coastal communities. This is the major issue.

Take black sole. Ireland has only 4.5% of a quota, while the Belgians and their new modern fleet have 87% of a quota. The TAC was the biggest hammer blow, along with the Brexit trade agreement. Ireland's fishermen paid the price for other European countries. We were forced to transfer 15% of our quota to UK and Scottish vessels. Ireland was the main contributor. We carried the can for Europe. We transferred 40% of the total value of the whole flawed deal. We put 40% into that. I am not blaming the Minister of State, but where were our people out there? All we heard in Killybegs was that burden-sharing was coming, it would sort itself out and we would get a great deal.Since that day I have not heard the phrase "burden-sharing". The Europeans have not come back to say they will give Ireland a wee bit back. Some 15% of the quota of Dublin Bay prawns, which was a key traditional stock, was transferred to keep our fisherman in Clogherhead going. We transferred 15%. You could not write it. We lost a very valuable traditional squid fishery at Rockall. I am looking in from the outside. I was not here; I am glad to be here now. The Minister of State, Deputy Dooley, was not in his position then. Where was our Government? It did not fight for Rockall. We could sustain the whitefish fleet in Killybegs because they could fish in Rockall for a couple of months of the year. That is all gone. We have one whitefish boat in Killybegs now. It is ridiculous stuff. Through decommissioning, we lost 39 vessels. That is a whole coastal community gone. I was down in Castletownbere the same day as the Minister of State. It lost a lot more than we did in Killybegs. That community has been wiped out. The whitefish community down there has been wiped out because of this. Not alone that, it has a knock-on effect on the net jobs, the shops and the fuel suppliers.

We need to try to start working on the rebalancing of a disproportionate transfer of the TAC. We need generational renewal and to try to encourage young people into the sector. Any young person I talk to now is not interested. When I was at school in Killybegs all the boys could not wait to get away to fish and get their skipper’s ticket. It was a lifetime job. Now they are lucky to get a month of the year out of it. Something I feel so mad about is the penalty points system for fisherman. Who drew this up? It is obvious they did not consult on any of it. A fisherman has to make a guesstimate and if he is over it he is pulled in to be over his 10%. Then he cannot go on his holidays or do anything because he has legal issues. This is something that needs to be sorted as soon as possible because it is having a big effect.

We have tuna fishing. The Minister of State mentioned new species. That is a species we should be looking at. We have a very small quota of it and they are off our coast. For our inshore fishermen who catch crab and lobster, if we could even get three or four tuna a year that would be €5,000 or €6,000. It would keep our small traditional fishermen going and add value to their season. We never got a level playing field in Europe and the whole thing is wrong.

What can be done to try to keep our coastal communities living? The first thing we need to do is to concentrate on fishermen’s PAYE. That is something that can be sorted fairly quickly. I have been talking to the Minister for Finance about it and with a joint effort we could try to see if we could do something there. That would relieve some of the pressure. The Department needs to work with everybody too. We need to all pull together and be on the one wavelength.

We need to up our game in Europe, we really do. The SFPA needs to help the industry too. Monitors need to go back into the factories. This craic of doing what they are doing is not on. It is really affecting the quality of the fish. Time is running out for a lot of people in the industry. My business is on the breadline. The Minister of State was in Killybegs and talked to boatmen. He heard their frustration. There is frustration out there. He said he could see there were people trying to rejuvenate themselves and everything. I get that, but it is not going to happen quickly enough. We need help and we need it soon. Our fishing industry was sold out for other things. Let us be honest about it. We got a bad deal. We need to deliver on things now. The time is running out here.

I commend the Minister of State on going around and meeting people to listen to their issues. We never had that before and it is brilliant. He is engaging, but we need more than that. Engaging is all right, but we need delivery. I have been at this four years since I called the first public meeting. I never thought I would be here standing on front of the Minister of State in this House. About 300 people turned up at that public meeting. I will be honest that Fine Gael took the fight. We took it to our Ministers and our Taoiseach at the time and they played ball. We got it into the programme for Government and one of our big asks was that we get a Minister of State with responsibility for the marine and I am delighted we did. I am very happy with Deputy Dooley. In every engagement I have had with him so far he has been very good.

It is all right having all this stuff, but the people looking at this from home tell me it is fine for me to be up there shouting about this and that, but what can I see coming to try to help us sustain our fishing communities. If we do not stand up to be counted now, we are finished. We have given so much we have nothing left to give. We really have. It is time we got something solid from Europe. The Commissioner was over. He seems to be a very nice man and he wants to engage, but it is time for him to deliver. Let him deliver for us. We have to get other quotas in here. We have to try to catch other species. We have to try to keep our coastal communities going. I am sorry if the Minister of State thinks I am giving out to him but it is just something I feel so passionate about. We have been trod on for years and years and it is great to get the chance to come in here and put the points straight to him.