I move that the Bill be now read a Second Time.
One of the principal purposes of the Bill is to make it possible for the Government to implement and ratify the Fisheries Convention concluded in London along with three associated Agreements and Protocol, on 9th March this year. The Convention, Agreements and Protocol were signed by the Taoiseach on 18th March. Copies have been laid before both Houses for the information of Deputies and members of the Seanad.
We are not concerned in this Bill with the territorial seas but only with the exclusive fishery limits of the State, and I wish to emphasise that the breadth of the territorial seas of the State remains at three miles, in accordance with section 3 of the Maritime Jurisdiction Act, 1959.
I need hardly say that we were very glad indeed to accept the invitation to take part in the Conference on Fisheries which assembled in London on the initiative of the British Government. The outcome of that conference —the Convention which is now before the Dáil—is the welcome culmination of persistent efforts by the Government for a number of years to secure the extension of our exclusive fishery limits. Since 1958 my Department and the Department of Fisheries have taken part in several international conferences and have been in constant diplomatic contact with many Governments with a view to getting acceptance of an appropriate world-wide international agreement on this problem. I am happy to say that although we failed to obtain the world-wide agreement we sought we have at least succeeded in getting the extension of exclusive fishery limits with the goodwill of our neighbouring countries.
Deputies may recollect that, despite the great measure of international approval for the Canadian and United States proposals at the First Geneva Conference on the Law of the Sea in 1958 and for the joint United States/Canadian proposals at the Second Geneva Conference in 1960 in favour of extending exclusive fishery zones beyond the territorial seas, no further progress in this matter was made until the conclusion of the London Fisheries Convention this year. This Convention is a regional agreement only, but is in conformity with the growing tendency in all parts of the world, accelerated since the 1958 and 1960 conferences, to recognise the right of States to exclusive fishery limits extending beyond the territorial seas. The tendency may perhaps be attributed to a gradual recognition in international law of the priority rights of fishermen of the coastal state to exploit the waters within a reasonable distance of their own coasts even though those waters are not within their territorial seas. The tendency may also be described as an obvious practical means of ensuring the conservation of fishery resources around the coastal state and their development primarily for the use of the local population.
The London Convention provides that a party to it may, without objection from other parties, extend its fishery limits to a distance of 12 miles from the coast or straight baselines, as the case may be. Within the outer six miles of that 12-mile belt, a right to fish is recognised to States which have habitually fished there between January, 1953, and December, 1962. We propose to designate such States by order under section 3 (1) of the Bill.
The Convention also provides in Article 9 that States parties which have habitually fished within the 3 to 6-mile belt should be allowed a reasonable period of time to adapt themselves to their exclusion from that belt. The implementation of this provision of the Convention has been effected by one of the associated Agreements between the Government of Ireland, on the one hand and the Governments of Belgium, Britain, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Spain on the other, and in section 3 (2) of this Bill we take power to implement the provisions of this associated Agreement. Under subsection 3 (2), the Government propose to designate Belgium, Britain, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Spain, thereby giving the fishermen of those countries a right to fish in the appropriate areas within the 3 to 6-mile belt up to December, 1965, where the baseline is low water mark, and up to December, 1966, in areas measured from straight baselines.
The effect of the Bill, therefore, will be that when it comes into operation, the vessels of the countries which I have indicated may continue to fish in the appropriate areas of the 3 to 6-mile zone until the end of 1965 along most of the east coast and where no straight baselines have been drawn, and until the end of 1966 around the rest of the coast; but after those dates, the vessels of those countries will be permitted to fish only in appropriate areas outside the six mile limit. Vessels of all other states will be excluded from the 12-mile belt from the coming into operation of the Bill.