Vol. 290 No. 1
asked the Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries the provision he proposes to make for fishery protection officers of the Waterford Board of Conservators who have received dismissal notices, as they are not eligible for redundancy payments or pensions.
25.
asked the Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries if he is aware that Waterford Board of Conservators have had to serve dismissal notice on several of its fishery protection officers and that, as a result, fish stocks in the Nore, Suir and Barrow rivers will be unprotected.
With the permission of the Ceann Comhairle, I propose to take Questions Nos. 24 and 25 together.
I understand that some time ago the Waterford Board of Conservators issued a communication to its employees to the effect that if the Exchequer grant to the board for the present year were drastically reduced redundancies in the board's staff would be inevitable. In fact, the board's grant has been increased by almost 50 per cent compared with last year. I am satisfied that there will be no necessity for the board to lay off staff because of shortage of funds and I understand that following recent talks with my Department the board have accepted that this is the position.
I take it that the notices served on the fisheries staff will be withdrawn?
Yes. There was no need to serve those notices because the position is that the amount of grant approved for the Waterford Board of Conservators for the year ending 30th September, 1976 is £53,000 compared with £36,000 in the previous year—an increase of £17,000. In the circumstances, the board appreciate now that it was totally unnecessary to issue those notices.
The Parliamentary Secretary concedes that notice was served on the staff. Having regard to this and to the inherent danger of the question arising again as well as taking into consideration that such workers do not have recourse to redundancy payments or pensions, can the Parliamentary Secretary ensure that this situation will be corrected?
The Department are not in any way to blame for the issuing of these notices by the Waterford Board of Conservators. Regarding the second part of the Deputy's supplementary, I would remind him that the employees of boards of conservators are much better off now than they were when the Deputy was Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries.
I asked the Parliamentary Secretary whether he would take steps to ensure that the retirement situation of fishery protection staff be improved in relation to redundancy payments and pensions. It is time that this situation was rectified. Therefore, can the Parliamentary Secretary give us an assurance that he will take steps in this direction?
We have taken many steps to improve the position of employees of boards of conservators, particularly in Waterford.
Obviously, the answer is "No".
