I move:
That Seanad Éireann approves the draft of the Elections of Conservators (Postponement) Order, 1975 which was laid before Seanad Éireann on the 16th of June, 1975.
Elections of Conservators (Postponement) Order, 1975: Motion.
Under the Fisheries (Consolidation) Act, 1959, as amended by the Fisheries (Amendment) Act, 1962, elections to boards of conservators are scheduled to be held every five years but the elections due to take place in October, 1974, were, in accordance with the Fisheries (Amendment) Act, 1974, postponed to 1975 or such later year as may be fixed by order. As provided in the Act of 1974 it is now proposed to make an order postponing these elections to 1976.
It had been my intention to introduce legislation which would improve the constitution of boards of conservators and the system of election of members. However, before introducing amending legislation it was decided to await the final report of the Inland Fisheries Commission which has been examining all aspects of inland fisheries. It was considered desirable that, if the commission had additional proposals in regard to boards of conservators, consideration should be given to the widening of the proposed legislation to include such proposals.
I am pleased to say that the report has now been received. It is a very exhaustive report and will require very careful study over the next few months. While at this stage I am not in a position to make a statement on the general contents of the report, I can say that it does in fact contain some very important recommendations affecting boards of conservators. In Dáil Éireann last week the Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries paid tribute to the chairman and the members of the commission for the hard work they have put into the task which they have now accomplished. I would like to be associated with that tribute.
The Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries also expressed appreciation of the work in the conservation and protection of our fisheries which has been accomplished by the Boards of Conservators. As we know the members of the boards have worked on a voluntary basis and they have given their help and time most readily. I would like also to record my appreciation of their work. I look forward to the boards' members continuing in office for a further year, during which time the preparation of the necessary legislation for improved conditions governing boards of conservators will be a matter of priority for my Department.
I accordingly recommend to the House that a resolution be passed approving of the draft order.
We have no objection to the postponing of this in view of what the Parliamentary Secretary has said. I would join with him in complimenting the Inland Fisheries Commission on the task they have undertaken. This matter of the election of boards of conservators is very important because of the work connected with improving and developing our fisheries. The Parliamentary Secretary might, perhaps, say something with regard to the Drogheda Board of Conservators being abolished and why they were abolished.
The work the Parliamentary Secretary is undertaking is important and he is quite right to delay the elections until he has made himself au fait with the recommendations having studied them minutely. Preservation of our fisheries is tremendously important, not alone because of the amount of money that will flow from them but because of our tourist industry in particular. In many areas we have a great influx of English, French and German fishermen annually and fisheries are, therefore, a part of our economy we cannot afford to neglect. While we may offer prizes for the largest pike, salmon and so on we have also to watch the preservation of the different species to ensure our rivers will be stocked. This ties in with pollution and with anything that might depreciate stocks or ruin the fishing industry in toto. Consequently this, to us on this side of the House, is a very important exercise and I welcome it wholeheartedly.
Boards of conservators have had a very difficult task. It is not a popular board to serve under. For many years poaching was very prevalent and there was agitation, and rightly so. Many of our rivers should be handed over to public ownership and compensation paid, if necessary, to ensure they are handed over. We have a great potential asset so far as fishing is concerned.
The ESB own rights to some rivers such as the Boyne and the Erne. In the case of the Erne, which is a cross-Border river, I am sure there will be close co-operation between the Six Counties and here. I suggest the Minister should have consultations where a river flows from the Twenty-six Counties into the Six Counties. It would be much wiser to handle these on a catchment area basis rather than on locations. A river flowing from the Six Counties into the Twenty-six Counties would carry their industrial waste and vice versa. I welcome the Order.
I should like to join my voice to what has been said by Senator Dolan. What is being proposed is eminently sensible now that the Report of the Inland Fisheries Commission is available. This report contains proposals is affecting boards of conservators and it seems appropriate that we should defer their reappointment for a year. I also join with others in paying tribute to those who served on the Inland Fisheries Commission. I say this as someone who met the commission when they visited Galway. Their report is a document of great urgency.
This summer alone in the city in which I live there are quite a number of people who are very seriously concerned about the future of salmon. There are a number of reasons for this. The particular circumstances of the very dry year mean the salmon have great difficulty in returning to spawn and it is becoming increasingly important that we have new and imaginative legislation in relation to salmon and trout stock preservation. I know that the Parliamentary Secretary will have courage— he has shown this before—in taking some unpopular decisions concerning conservation.
I think that, for example, the absurd position by which it is a State responsibility for the most part to provide for the replacement of stocks while private fisheries do not have stringent legal obligations on them in this respect is unsatisfactory. The boards of conservators, when they are established, will be dealing with new and amended laws and clearer laws, as against the confusion which has arisen concerning, for example, the question of the responsibility for water levels which, I understand, lies with the Board of Works. Water levels affect the possibility of the salmon going up river. The responsibility for fisheries needs to be more precisely specified.
As I said, I am glad to see the Parliamentary Secretary in the Seanad tonight because I know he has taken some unpopular decisions. It is difficult to make decisions when one is speaking, for example, concerning poaching, pollution and the indiscrimate use of nets. This is something which we will have to face. We are dealing now with an order postponing the election of boards of conservators and, in our own time, it may well be that there may be no need for such elections because we may have done such damage to fish stocks. I hope we will see legislation as soon as possible, legislation with real teeth. Such legislation could most appropriately take into community ownership private fisheries. It is only by matching together the usage of our fishing resources with the responsibility for spawning that we can ensure the future of the species. Senator Dolan was quite right in his reference. This work should not only be embarked upon but it should be escalated to the level of a public relations exercise to educate people into a sense of the importance and value of salmon and trout in particular.
I must confess it is no great pleasure for me to say I do not think I have witnessed in a long time such brutality and savageness as I have witnessed in Galway city this summer. There has been an indiscriminate butchery of salmon. This is at a time when we are postponing the election of people who have served well in a voluntary capacity. I look forward to legislation with real teeth and I hope the new boards of conservators will have good statutory instruments to enable them to discharge their duties and deal with the real threats of pollution and other sources of attack on important fish species.
I should like to say a few words in joining with the Senators who have congratulated our boards of conservators who down through the years have acted in a voluntary capacity and have done trojan work. I think it is proper the elections should be postponed because many years of research have gone into this report on inland fisheries. The report will need deep study. As Senator Dolan said, there are many aspects of conservation of salmon and other species in general that need attention, especially from the point of view of pollution. With more industrialisation and many other problems in the agricultural field, pollution is now much more serious than it was, say, ten or 20 years ago. This is something that needs very deep discussion.
Another point that needs study is that our fishing in many areas has changed and I think the beginning and the ending of the season in different areas need to be looked into. I am speaking from experience in my own area. What was true about the start of the fishing season in north Kerry ten or 20 years ago has completely changed. Another thing that needs looking into is the question of penalties. I think the penalties inflicted on those convicted of fishing offences are completely out of line with penalties inflicted for other offences. If you are convicted of a motor offence your motor car in not confiscated, or if you are convicted of a breach of the licensing law your pub is not confiscated. That is another aspect of the fishing industry that needs to be changed and seriously investigated and looked into. I have seen people suffer very heavily. Not only are they not able to fish for the season because of one minor offence, but they have to suffer the loss of their gear as well. I hope this will be looked into in future.
I do not object to this motion, but the substantive issue behind it is of tremendous importance and we look forward to receiving the legislation, which the Parliamentary Secretary has promised us, at the earliest possible moment. In the debate which took place on 24th July, 1974, on the Fisheries (Amendment) Bill, the Parliamentary Secretary said he hoped that before October, 1974 we would be in a position to bring in the legislation which he discussed here before the Houses of the Oireachtas and he said he was awaiting the report of the Inland Fisheries Commission. This clearly was the right thing to do. I know various people have tried to get the Commission to produce their report, perhaps a little more speedily than they did. It is a report of the most tremendous importance. I am one of those people who line up with Senator Higgins here in saying that if we do not tackle this problem now there will not be a problem left to tackle because some of our most important species of fish will disappear.
I have talked on various occasions about this problem. I know the Parliamentary Secretary has it in his heart but I also know that we have different views on this problem. One thing I would say to him and to his Department is that when he and his Department have spent sufficient time digesting and discussing this report, which is their right, they then publish the report before they bring legislation forward to the Houses of the Oireachtas. If we have legislation and we have not seen the report, this completely hamstrings us in not having the background to the problem. The background is something of serious debate and query.
The boards of conservators at the moment are really an anachronism. It is not their fault by any means, the fault lies in the fact that they are directed by legislation which was drawn up in 1848. In 1848 fishing was a totally different game to what it is now. The only way you propelled yourself was by means of rowing or sailing. You had not got these high powered trawlers, motor boats. The length of net you were able to drag after your boat was pretty short if you were rowing, no matter how many oars you had. You did not have the facilities which people have for hauling nets, in certain parts of the country, over a mile long. I know that this has happened, and to my mind many of the types of fishing that are going on now are just legalised poaching—they are within the law. The boards of conservatives can do nothing about them. The boards are composed of local people who have got to impose penalties on other local people. The whole thing has got out of hand altogether.
Senator Higgins has pointed this out, and I will try to back this up with some figures. If we do not do something very soon, something radical—and I hope the Parliamentary Secretary takes a radical eye in drawing up this legislation—then, as far as some species of fish are concerned there will not be a problem. Certainly the boards of conservatives as they now stand are quite incapable because of the way they are constructed, because of the legislation that governs them drawn up in 1848, because of the commercialisation of the entire fishing industry. They are just not able to deal with the situation.
In 1961 a total of 319 drift nets killed 218,000 lbs weight of salmon while in 1972 a total of 1,156 drift nets killed 2,350,000 lbs weight. On another occasion in this House I gave the dreadful comparative figures for spawning in the various rivers—the number of fish that go through the counters on the rivers in which salmon are counted. I will just give one or two. In 1963-64, one river in the north-west had a spawning count of 800; in 1972-73 it was 103. The Derg river had a spawning count in 1963-64 of 2,497; in 1972-73 it was 138. The Fane river had a spawning count of 2,039; in 1972-73 it was 156. These figures are taken from the Foyle Fisheries Report which is one of the better known cross-border pieces of co-operation between North and South.
Every fisherman knows the dangers which the salmon and trout species face. Let us be absolutely clear, all this talk of nationalisation of fisheries is not the answer. Do not let us get the idea that nationalisation will solve the problem because the drift netting which is wrecking the salmon fishing, to my way of thinking, is done in the nationalised parts of our waters. In other words, it is done outside the river estuaries. It is done off shore. It is done in the part of the country that is owned by everybody. That is why, under the legislation which we have, people can get away with what they are getting away with because of the totally inadequate provisions.
The situation in countries which have really worried about their salmon stocks is that drift netting has been totally abolished. It is abolished in Britain and it is abolished in Canada. It cost a great deal of money to abolish it, because, as the Parliamentary Secretary pointed out, and he is perfectly right, there are a large number of people who earn their living from drift netting of salmon. In those countries they took the big decision and said: "If we are to have any salmon left at all we must buy out the people who are earning their living from this." In the case of the US and Canada it cost many millions of dollars.
We will have to face decisions of this type if we wish the fish to survive. The point is that the increase in the number of drift nets is a recent phenomenon. The salmon has a fairly long life cycle. The grilse has a four to six year life cycle, so one does not know for four years after the figures like I have given, 1972, what the situation is to be. I do some fishing every year.
I know that a lot of the Members of the House do also. Some of them may be involved in commercial fishing. I know that the feeling throughout the country among fishing folk is that if legislation is not introduced in the very near future which gets a real grip on this problem, there will not be any salmon left to fish for. We are killing the goose that laid the golden eggs. This is why it is essential that this promise the Parliamentary Secretary has given, which I know is a genuine one, be implemented. It is essential that the report which the Inland Fisheries Commission have taken a long time to produce and which the Parliamentary Secretary says has many radical suggestions—one hopes regarding the whole of the problems of our inland waters and offshore estuaries—be digested by the Department and then be published so that the public, and particularly Members of this Parliament, know what is going on, what the authentic figures are, so that we will not have any argument as to whether the salmon is going to survive.
I have one point of view. I say that under present legislation, with the present number of drift nets, it has no chance. The Parliamentary Secretary has a different point of view. The Inland Fisheries Commission report should separate it and should give us a chance to see exactly what the position is. I am only looking at the figures that I get from various sources such as the Foyle Fisheries Report, the counts of salmon caught by drift nets, the number of drift net licences issued, the sort of fish caught. We want a much more comprehensive review, and it is now on the Parliamentary Secretary's table, and when he has digested and decided on the best course and the legislation, I urge him most strongly to publish this report. Otherwise we and the public will be working totally in the dark. If that report is not published, when the substantive Bill comes along there will be some pretty hot stuff. If we do not have it, then we will be working in the dark, and that is not the way a parliament or legislature should work.
I agree with the postponement of the board of conservator elections. I hope that the whole idea of local boards will be totally changed. It is totally anachronistic—all this legislation is out of date; it comes from 1848. The field is different now. We have not many years to act. Unless we act, and unless the Parliamentary Secretary is imaginative and radical and acts on the findings of the Commission, then many species of fish will not be a problem—there will just not be any fish.
I welcome the opportunity to discuss this motion. It seems to me that the Irish are never happy unless they are talking in a gloomy mood. About 20 years ago it was a case of the vanishing Irish, nowadays it is a case of the vanishing salmon. The talk about the vanishing salmon is just as loose as the talk about the vanishing Irish was.
We will find out in the report when it is published.
A lot of the statements which were made were due to a lack of knowledge.
Exactly. That is the whole point.
I come from an area where there is quite a lot of drift net fishing done. We see no diminution whatsoever in the numbers of salmon being caught. This is six years after the coming of drift netting as we know it. Surely there would have been a tremendous depletion of the stock by now if it was having the effect stated. I categorically state that the measure introduced by the Minister two years ago to restrict the number of licences and the measures brought in more recently to restrict the length and depth of nets have been a success. They have succeeded in conserving the stock. It is all very well for people like Senator West and some others to tell us the drift netting is ruining our salmon stock. The fact of the matter is, there are 3,000 people engaged in fishing for salmon by this method, and there are at least 3,000 more people in the attached industries such as handling, transport and selling. Indeed the figure could be much higher. This is all in the general remote coastal areas. There is little or no industry in these areas. The only alternative in many case would be to emigrate.
I should like to add my voice of appreciation to previous speakers as regards the voluntary work which is being done by the present boards of conservators. The public may not realise that it is voluntary. Not alone do they not get paid for the work they have been doing, they do not even get expenses for travelling to the meetings which they attend frequently. In some cases this entails journeys of 70 or 80 miles and, especially in the high season such as this, for active fishermen to leave their employment and travel to and fro distances of that magnitude is a tremendous sacrifice, and they deserve the highest credit.
If I were asked why or what is causing damage to our salmon crop I could quite easily tell you. The answer is twofold: one, poaching and two, pollution. I have no objection whatsoever to having the election of the conservators postponed for one year, because I am sure it will bring up a more streamlined type of conservator or board of conservators. At the moment they are grossly under-financed. This leads to insufficient numbers of waterkeepers, which in turn leads to a tremendous lot of poaching.
There is a tremendous lot of poaching going on at the moment. It must be stopped. You are not just safeguarding the tourist industry, because you are attracting continentals and Americans who are searching for rod fishing, but you are also protecting the 6,000 people I have already spoken about who are engaged in drift netting. The poaching is of gigantic proportion and Senator Higgins mentioned earlier that it is frightening in the Corrib and the Moy. We are told from newspaper reports that the gangs engaged in poaching are highly organised and even armed at times. This must be most intimidating for waterkeepers who are trying to do their job, and I ask the Parliamentary Secretary to make sure that under the new legislation as a result of the Inland Fisheries Commission report, the conservators will be given sufficient finance and sufficient powers to combat this type of carry on.
Might I refer to the employees of the boards of conservators, the bailiffs? It is most unjust that people who have got the ugly and dangerous job, as it is at times, are not given a greater standing, both financially and otherwise. At the moment all these people are employed only in a temporary capacity. Their positions are non-pensionable. Surely for such an onerous task that is not fair? When they use their own vehicles to patrol, usually late at night or in the small hours of the morning, the expenses they receive are piteously small. I should like the Parliamentary Secretary to try to remedy that situation.
It is very hard to equate the damage poachers do. I wonder if the boards responsible employed extra bailiffs what would the increase in the flow of spawning salmon be. It is very hard to do a mathematical equation on that. I imagine that the increase in the flow of salmon would be tremendous.
Senator West mentioned that certain rivers showed counts which were down by tenfold in some cases in comparison with the previous year. I should like to draw Senator West's attention to the fact that the main salmon fishing river in the country is the Blackwater. Last year at the weir at Clondullane there was never such a great number of spawning salmon passing upstream. The problem mentioned by Senator West could be a localised problem or one caused by the other factor I mentioned, pollution. It is obvious that fish will not go up a river which is polluted. I have seen it happen in small tributaries. I do not know to what extent it occurs and how great the pollution has to be. I remember the Parliamentary Secretary telling us here last year that he was appointing six officers to the boards of conservators to monitor pollution in the various rivers throughout the country. I would be interested to know the findings of these investigations.
The Minister and the Parliamentary Secretary might make available to public representatives, especially members of county councils, the findings of the people who do the monitoring, because it is often said that local authorities are the greatest polluters. We as elected Members would like to know to what extent pollution is occurring and where it is occurring. Maybe we could help to put a stop to it. We are all concerned to see that pollution is stopped. One of the greatest bogeys against having it stopped is the fact that the fines which can be imposed by the boards of conservators on industries and on local authorities and individuals who pollute rivers are trivial and do not at all compare with the extent of the damage. The boards of conservators should be allowed to claim damage at least in accord with standards which apply for other offences.
Another point I should like to stress is that Senator Higgins mentioned that private fisheries are not playing their part in seeing that the hatcheries and fisheries were restocked. I do not agree with that. I find that the owners of private fisheries are outstanding citizens. They do a very good job within the resources available to them. I dread the day when the rivers and lakes are nationalised because we would not get the same dedicated work, interest and the same concern as we are getting at the moment from these people. I have heard slogans thrown at these people like "West Britons" and "gentry". That is not the point. Whether they are native Irishmen, anglers or West Britons, they are doing a wonderful job. I take my hat off to them.
Even they claim that the owners of the Galway Fishery are dedicated restockers of the Corrib in terms of salmon.
Anywhere I have come across private owners of fisheries I have found them to be very sound citizens.
I hope I am not being referred to as a West Briton.
The elections of conservators seem to be a bit undemocratic. I do not know if you have ever heard this in public previously. It is a bit like the local election system which you had in Northern Ireland. It seems to work very well. For instance if you have a fishing licence for salmon and trout and it is less than £3 you are entitled to one vote. If it is less than £6 you are entitled to two votes. If it is more than £6 but less than £10 you are entitled to three votes and if it is more than £10 you are entitled to four votes. If you own a fishery the valuation of which is greater than £50 you do not have to stand for election at all, you automatically become a member of the board of conservators. It seems to be undemocratic but it appears to have worked quite well. Is it the intention of the Parliamentary Secretary to have this type of system abolished? If the Minister has a fishery which is valued at more than £50 he also is entitled to nominate somebody to the board of conservators. So he is involved in the whole racket. There is a lot to be said for it because it automatically means that the owner of a major private fishery is on the board of conservators. As I said previously, these people are invariably outstanding members and their ideas are very sound.
Finally, I go back to the point which I raised with the Parliamentary Secretary previously—the discrimination against some of the private fisheries whereby their fishing hours at week-ends are reduced. I feel the Parliamentary Secretary should revert to the original hours that obtained up to two years ago. In private fisheries such as the Black-water, fishing cannot commence on a Monday until 1 p.m. Elsewhere fishing can commence at 6 a.m. There is a time differential of seven hours. Seeing that these are the people who do the restocking of the rivers primarily and who pay fishery rates and provide quite a bit of employment, I feel they should not be penalised in this matter.
In particular, the basis on which this penalisation is based is wrong. It was assumed that the private fishery owner paid people a fixed wage. When they fished, everything they caught went to the owner. If he got £1,000 worth of fish in the week he paid four crewmen £25 each and he himself got £900. That is fictitious. In every case that I am aware of the crew members are also working on a share basis. So they, too, are penalised. They are at the moment earning a very meagre amount of money. I would ask the Parliamentary Secretary to have that situation revised. I do not know of one case where people are working on a fixed wage. The premise on which the restriction was brought in is completely incorrect. I should like to see for the next fishery season of 1976 that the hours be revised to what they were previously.
I thank Senators for agreeing to the motion and for the valuable contributions they have made. Senator Dolan in welcoming the motion referred to the position of the Drogheda board. The Drogheda board were abolished some time ago and the administrator is now acting as the board. The position is that the administrator will continue in office for the ensuing year. That position also obtains in so far as Cork is concerned.
We are all anxious to ensure that our fisheries will be conserved and that legislation will be enacted in the not too distant future that will endeavour to develop our inland and sea fisheries. I have in mind a comprehensive piece of legislation that would cover all aspects of our fisheries whether inland or sea fisheries.
The Senators expressed their appreciation of the members of the commission for the report. While we were all rather annoyed at the delay in giving us this report, at the same time the Senators will appreciate, as I appreciate, that it is a very bulky document and contains many suggestions and recommendations. So far as the point made by Senator West is concerned regarding the publication of this report, I fully support that view. I know from experience that reports from some commissions have never seen the light of day. This report should be submitted to the Government, as is the usual procedure.
Knowing the government's viewpoint on open Government, I cannot visualise the position obtaining whereby there would be any objections. If that is the case, it will have my support and recommendation. This report will soon be in the hands of Senators and Deputies who will have an opportunity of perusing it and making any recommendations or suggestions to the Department, even ahead of the legislation that will follow. On that comprehensive measure I would appreciate any recommendations or suggestions that can be examined and scrutinised in conjunction with the recommendations embodied in this report.
The fisheries question is big and wide enough to get everybody involved—the fishermen, the processors, the tourist trade, hoteliers and others who are naturally interested in our fisheries—to give their reports and recommendations. When such reports and recommendations are available in the Department, they will be scrutinised closely and diligently by departmental officers, by the Minister, myself and other interested bodies, such as BIM. I am hopeful that after some time— though it is difficult to specify a time because there is need for exhaustive examination of all the recommendations that will be made—I will be in a position to bring before the Houses of the Oireachtas a comprehensive Bill dealing with our fisheries generally. The Members of both Houses will then have an opportunity of expressing their views and making recommendations by way of amendments if they feel justified in doing so.
There is no political element in fisheries. Therefore, we could introduce legislation that would be different from other measures to be brought before the Houses. If there are amendments which, on examination in the Department, are found to be feasible and justifiable, irrespective of what side of the House they come from, we can change the measure to embody such recommendations.
Senator Higgins and others expressed concern about conservation of our salmon stocks. They feel annoyed that our present conservation measures are inadequate and as a result, to use their own phrases, we will have nothing to discuss or conserve in the not too distant future unless urgent action is taken now. The urgent action which both Senator Higgins and Senator West have in mind is the abolition of the drift net system. As I mentioned previously, the question of fish netting is a very big one on which opinion in the House is divided. A number of Senators on all sides of the House feel that we should be more liberal so far as the criteria set down for qualification for drift nets is concerned. On the other hand, we have the ultra-conservative view that we should do away with fish netting and abolish the system completely if we are to have salmon in our rivers and lakes.
I have to take all suggestions into account and have them examined on their merits. That is what we did on assuming office in 1973. We liberalised the systems available for drift nets for the reasons stated here by Senator Deasy. We are aware that a number of our people—Senator Deasy gave a figure of 3,000 around the coast—are dependent on salmon fishing for their livelihood. That figure is approximate, 950 or 960 multiplied by three, rounded to 3,000. That may seem a small number. Some people may ask why we should change the system for the sake of helping 3,000 out of a population of three million. But my view is that every citizen is entitled to have his case examined closely and carefully before any decision contrary to his interests is made. I felt that having examined it closely and carefully we could set down rather rigid criteria to qualify for a drift net licence.
I am satisfied that the administrators in the Cork and Drogheda areas and the boards in the 15 other divisions examined all applications on their merits. I would like to express my thanks to all concerned for the manner in which they determined the applications, because the information available to me is that the boards and administrators did, so far as they humanly could, make a fair and impartial assessment of the different applications. Naturally many applicants are disappointed. This year, for instance, it is quite possible that in some districts qualified applicants failed to secure a licence because the boards were restricted to the number of licences granted last year and that number could not be increased this year.
The concern of Senator West and Senator Higgins is a little beyond the marks of reality. Here is what is happening. I am not an expert by any manner of means but this is the position: an interim report of the Commission in 1971 indicated a need for conservation. In that year 3.3 million pounds in weight of salmon was taken in our lakes, sea and rivers. If that kind of fishing were to be continued, stocks would disappear. It rose in 1972 to 3.7 million pounds, in 1973 to 4.0 million pounds and in 1974 to 4.3 million pounds. In other words, catches are increasing steadily. I have no figures for 1975 because the season has not closed yet but from the reports available there is likely to be a further increase.
In 1974, 4.3 million pounds weight of salmon was caught. Between 70 per cent and 80 per cent of that was taken by drift nets and draft nets. The average price paid to the fishermen may be around 60p per pound. That is a sizable sum, approximately £2½ million to £2¾ million. The question facing the Department is, do we stop that? If we do, what guarantee have we that stocks will be maintained, because there is great variation of opinion so far as the habits of salmon are concerned. Will they come up the rivers to be caught by the tourists or the local anglers, or will they move away to some other country, to be caught in Greenland or some other place? That is the type of question we must ask ourselves.
While I have the greatest respect for scientific officers attached to the Department and private people who are well qualified and who have offered their opinions and suggestions, so far as dealing with salmon and their habits, and what happens if they are not caught, there is nobody capable of offering an opinion which could be deemed to be infallible. What we are doing now is keeping a close examination on the position, because conservation is uppermost in our minds. If we were satisfied that the policy we were pursuing would lead to the reduction of our stocks, appropriate action would be taken. It is not necessary to take up the time of Senators further on that point other than to say that this clash of opinion exists and we have adopted this course of granting from 900 to 1,000 drift net licences and a number of draft nets and that can be reviewed at any time. The information to date indicates that that position is likely to continue for 1976.
I agree with Senator West, Senator Higgins and Senator Deasy who referred strongly to poaching and the indiscriminate use of nets. From all the reports available, and even from the comments of Senators here, poaching seems to be widespread throughout the country. I have made it quite clear, so far as the Department of Agriculture and Fisheries are concerned, that we are giving every help possible to the boards to ensure that poaching will be reduced as much as possible, and we are giving every help to the people employed by the boards—the inspectors and water keepers—to achieve that objective.
I appreciate that the position is not good in some areas. My friend Senator Higgins painted a rather gloomy picture of what is happening in Galway. This brings one to the view that the present system of protection may be inadequate. I do not think this is the time to move into that because this is not a farreaching motion. That is one of the items that will be examined.
I have a great deal of sympathy for the water keepers. They are working in their own immediate locality. They have a very difficult job, different to our Garda Siochána who are working in outside areas. If they do their job conscientiously they have to go out and catch any of their neighbours, relatives or friends who are engaged in illegal fishing. That is something that possibly we will have to review when the time comes. Senator Deasy said that water keepers are receiving niggardly treatment by the Department. There could be some truth in that statement, if it had been made two years ago. Since this Government took office we have tried to improve the status of the water keepers certainly we have improved their financial position reasonably. I agree there is room for further improvement, but at the same time we are not unmindful of their task. The review of this question is an on-going process.
Senator Higgins touched on another point with which Senator West and Senator Deasy disagreed, that is, the community ownership of our fisheries. I held a personal view down through the years which has not changed. I felt there would be more respect for our fishery laws if we could acquire private fisheries on a compensatory basis, and possibly on a phased out system. This cannot be done overnight. Some people feel, possibly without justification, that poaching on private preserves is not in conflict with the law. They feel that these fisheries were taken from the people years ago, and even though they may have changed ownership since, the time is at hand to examine whether there should be a change made in that direction. My view is that the time will arrive sometime, when each citizen will have the right to fish where and whenever he likes, provided he complies with the regulations stipulated by the Houses of the Oireachtas. This will prove to our advantage.
Mention was made about the Erne. I wish to inform Senator Dolan that a joint protection committee, between the South and the North, exists to plan management policy for the Erne.
I hope Senator Dolan does not regard that as collaboration.
I regard it as co-operation.
The other point made concerned pollution officers. They have taken up duty and are working in collaboration with the inspectors of the board of conservators. They have investigated stretches of many rivers and have consulted with farmers and others about pollution. They report to the board of conservators and the information received in the Department is that they are performing a worthwhile job. In the not too distant future, we may be in a position to analyse their work in detail and possibly increase their numbers.
I appreciate the Seanad's interest in the preservation of our fish stocks and the development of our fisheries. I also appreciate the way the Seanad have received this motion. Everybody agreed it was right to have this deferment motion. It may take some time to prepare the comprehensive legislation we have in mind. I hope no Senator will be slow to make any recommendation, because I give the Seanad the assurance— as I have given other organisations— that all recommendations will be examined. We want everybody to be involved in drafting this legislation. If we get 50 suggestions and two or three can be embodied in the legislation, it will be a worthwhile job. We want to give people an opportunity of having a say in this legislation before it is presented to both Houses of the Oireachtas and I hope this legislation will help people make recommendations. I thank the Seanad for the manner in which they have dealt with the legislation.
Question put and agreed to.
The Seanad adjourned at 10.05 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Wednesday, 16th July, 1975.