Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 18 Mar 1931

Vol. 37 No. 14

Adjournment Debate. - Landing Facilities on the Gaeltacht Seaboard.

Mr. Cassidy

To-day I addressed two questions to the Minister for Lands and Fisheries, one dealing with the necessity for erecting landing places or slips on the islands of Innishmeane and Innisherrer, and another question dealing with the necessity for a proper landing place on the mainland for the islands of Gola, Innishmeane and Innisherrer. The question I put to the Minister in connection with the necessity for landing places on the mainland is as follows:—

To ask the Minister for Lands and Fisheries whether he is aware that great hardships, danger and financial loss are experienced by the fishermen from the islands of Gola, Innishmeane and Innisherrer, owing to the fact that there is no suitable landing place on the mainland available for them nearer than Kincasslagh or Burtonport, and whether he will make the necessary arrangements to have a suitable pier or landing place constructed at Magheragallon.

The Minister in his reply stated:—

My attention has already been drawn by Deputy Law and others to the request for additional landing accommodation at Magheragallon. I am not aware of any hardship on the island fishermen due to lack of landing facilities in that district. There are three landing places on the mainland convenient to these islands, none of them being more than two miles distant. There is a good pier at Magheragallon, and I cannot recommend any expenditure from State sources on building another landing place there.

The reply the Minister gave me to-day was so inaccurate that I could not let it go unchallenged. I do not know whether the Minister prepared the reply himself, but I can tell him it was absolutely inaccurate. If it were prepared by some officials in his Department the only thing I can say is that they supplied him with wrong information. The Minister states: that he was not aware of any hardship due to lack of landing facilities from the three landing places. I suppose he was referring to Bunbeg, Carrick and Magheragallon. He stated in his reply that there is a good pier at Magheragallon. I wonder was he sincere in that. Naturally the conclusion about a pier is that a pier should be a place where boats can land. Is the Minister aware that the present pier is blocked up with sandbanks and that the fishermen are not able in all tides to effect a landing? When the tide is out no boat can land. If the tide is low they have to wait until the tide comes in with the result that there is serious delay and loss caused and the fish are classed as overday fish or comparatively stale fish.

[An Leas-Cheann Comhairle took the Chair.]

Is the Minister aware that practically no fish have been landed at Carrick owing to the fact that no buyers come there as there is no road to the pier? If the Minister wanted to make Carrick pier a proper one, he would have to have the rocks removed at the east side, and the pier extended forty feet seaward. It would be necessary to construct a road if fish are to be landed there. As to the pier at Bunbeg, is the Minister aware that herring or salmon can only be landed there at high tide? Sometimes when fishermen land herring at Bunbeg, if the tide recedes they have to remain on the open pier during cold winter nights, perhaps for seven hours, because their boats are stranded. That has happened scores of times. The Minister may say that fishing in that area is not very important. I would point out that there are approximately 100 fishermen operating there and about 22 boats, most of them open boats. During the year ending November, 1931, the catch of herring, excluding salmon, was approximately 3,000 cran. The people are experts in the fishing industry, and they believe that if there were proper landing facilities at Magheragallon the catches would be larger. They believe they might get up to 10,000 cran of herring per annum. The fishing cannot be developed owing to the handicaps from which the people suffer. Very often fishermen from the islands have to proceed to Kincasslagh, a distance of eight miles, in order to land fish. Notwithstanding what the Minister says, that there are good landing places at Magheragallon, I think if he makes inquiries he will find that that is not a fact. The Minister knows the district comparatively well, and he knows that it is a hardship to have to go six or eight miles in an open boat, particularly during the winter months, in order to earn a livelihood. Those engaged in the fishing industry believe that the proper place for a pier is at Magheragallon, a little to the north side of the graveyard. There is plenty of deep water there, and comparatively little expenditure would enable the fishermen, who are struggling against adverse conditions, to eke out a livelihood.

As the Minister is aware, and as the records will prove, the Congested Districts Board had a place at Magheragallon, where there is deep water, mapped out for a pier. Owing to the fact that the Congested Districts Board was dissolved the work was not carried out and, as a result, the fishermen are still suffering hardships. The Minister is also aware that curers do not attend at Carrick, Bunbeg or Magheragallon because the trawlers cannot land there. If there were proper landing places the curers would go there and additional employment would be given, especially during the winter months when the men are practically idle. I also raised a question about the provision of landing slips at Innishmeane and Innisherrer, and I hope the Minister will reconsider his decision on the matter. I may be asked where is the money to come from. In the financial year 1928-29 this House voted for marine works, and for the erection of small landing slips, £2,500. Only £1,093 was expended on marine works leaving a balance of £1,427 unexpended. It was alleged by officials in the Minister's Department that no requisitions for landing slips had been received. That is not so, as requisitions were sent from the islands concerned. In 1925-26 £21,638 was unexpended according to the Appropriation Accounts, in 1926-27, £14,839 was unexpended, and again in 1927-28, £11,991 was unexpended.

The Minister is aware that Recommendation 69 of the Gaeltacht Commission Report recommended that expenditure be incurred in providing small slips and breakwaters and in repairing some existing ones. The Executive Council issued a White Paper dealing with the report in which it was stated that money was at present available for the erection of landing slips in places where these were necessary. I submit to the Minister that landing slips are necessary on the two islands I have mentioned and I submit further that it would be worth while for his Department to expend the necessary money to erect a proper pier at Magheragallon. The Minister in his reply said there is a good pier there, but I would ask him to send an inspector there and I am sure that he will report that my statement is absolutely correct—that the pier is blocked up with sand banks and that the fishermen at times cannot land there. I submit, in view of the recommendation in the Gaeltacht report, the statement made in the White Paper, and the attempt which is being made at present to improve the sea fishing industry through the Sea Fisheries Association, that it is absolutely necessary that a proper pier should be erected at Magheragallon and also landing slips on the two islands.

Mr. Carney

The Minister should know that Magheragallon Strand cannot be navigated even by boats of small draught except during high tides, and that people from the islands can almost walk across to the mainland to Mass at low tide. If the Minister does not know that he should know it. Furthermore, there is deep water where it is proposed to erect the slip. That scheme was formulated during the C.D.B. regime. The Minister has never done anything to ascertain if the scheme formulated by the C.D.B. was feasible. Deputy Cassidy, Deputy Blaney and myself have brought to the notice of the Minister the necessity for several slips and piers, and with one exception they have not been attended to. When the Minister was in Donegal two years ago I drew his attention to two slips, but nothing has been done in reference to them. One was at St. John's Point, and the other at Meena-cross. These are parallel cases with those which Deputy Cassidy has brought up. The Deputy has brought up the cases of islands off the coast of Donegal, where piers or slips used by the fishermen years ago cannot be used now because they have been silted up. The Minister's Department has never attempted to ascertain whether they can be used by the fishermen or not. The Minister knows what happened on one of the islands off the mainland—the island of Inishtrahull. The people of that island had to vacate it because the fishing had deteriorated to such an extent that they could not live on the island. The Minister was not able to do anything which would enable them to remain on the island. He could not prevent foreign poachers from coming in.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I am afraid the Deputy is getting a long way from the question under discussion.

Mr. Carney

I want to point out that the people on the island referred to by Deputy Cassidy have no facilities for catching and landing fish, and that the same fate that befell the people of Inishtrahull will befall the people of these islands unless something is done to help them. The Minister would be well advised to send some experts to find out whether the pier that he talks about is adequate for the people of these islands or the people of the mainland. If it is not, some money should be expended on the erection of a slip or in improving existing slips in order to help these people. If the Minister does not do that we will have a repetition of what occurred at Inish-trahull—an exodus of the people on the islands, and also of the people on the mainland, and the Minister and his Department will be primarily responsible.

Minister for Lands and Fisheries (Mr. Lynch)

It is interesting to see Deputies Carney and Cassidy shedding tears over the departure of a British Department—the C.D.B.

Mr. Cassidy

The C.D.B. did more than your Department ever did, so far as spending money is concerned.

Mr. Lynch

The Deputy, at any rate, apparently regrets very much the passing of the British.

Mr. Cassidy

I think the Minister should not be allowed to make that statement. He knows I do nothing of the sort. What I was referring to was that the C.D.B. did more for Donegal than the Minister's Department.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Minister must be allowed to make his statement.

Mr. Lynch

The Deputy says that this British Department did more for Donegal than the present national Government is doing, and therefore one has to assume that he regrets the passing of the British.

Mr. Cassidy

You need not assume anything of the sort. You know you are not speaking the truth, and the Deputy behind you, on your own benches, can bear me out in that.

Mr. Lynch

What other assumption is there to draw from what the Deputy said?

Mr. Carney

We did more than you did to get the British out.

Mr. Lynch

Some of you think you did a terrible lot in your time. There were two questions raised here: one as to landing accommodation on the mainland, and another as to the accommodation on the islands themselves. As I pointed out in my reply, there is a pier at Magheragallon, built by the C.D.B. about 25 years ago, and maintained since at State expense. It is not right to say that it is incapable of receiving boats. Except very rarely the accommodation is perfectly ample. On one occasion last winter when there was something in the nature of a surprise landing of herrings, the boats were held up for four or five hours outside the pier waiting for the tide, but normally this pier is used, chiefly in May and June, for the landing of salmon, and no complaint has ever been made by the fishermen that the pier has been inaccessible.

Mr. Cassidy

Has the Minister got no complaints from the fishermen?

Mr. Lynch

If the Deputy does not want me to reply, all right; I can say no more.

Mr. Cassidy

I want an accurate reply. A reply without equivocation.

Mr. Lynch

I listened to the Deputy very patiently for a quarter of an hour. If he does not want me to reply now let him say so, and I shall say no more; I shall just walk out, but if I am to make a reply I want to be allowed to make it in my own way. My information is that the pier at Magheragallon is quite sufficient for the needs of the fishermen there. I am informed that there is a considerable amount of silting, and that can be removed by dredging, not by building a new pier. I have no information as to what were or were not the intentions of the Congested Districts Board with regard to new piers. In recent years the question of a new pier has been raised there, but there is no guarantee that silting would not take place there too. In fact, it is almost certain that silting will take place along a sandy coast. In addition, you have to build road accommodation. There is proper road accommodation to Magheragallon built, but to build a pier at Beerbuidhe you would require a road giving access to it.

This whole question of building piers and slips is one that requires very careful study, because everyone knows that in the past a great deal of public money was spent on the building of slips and piers, many of which have hardly ever been used. We want to avoid wasting money in that way, and it is for that reason that the Departmental Committee, which deals with the economic situation in the Gaeltacht, has referred to a sub-committee this whole question of piers and slips along the coast. That is being investigated, in order, first of all, to map out the places where piers at present are, and what use is made of them, and then to list with them applications that have come in for piers— there are innumerable applications from all over the country—so that it may be decided what are necessary and what are not.

I think the answer therefore to the second part of the question with regard to the landings in the islands is a perfectly reasonable answer, namely, that this matter of the building of slips will be considered by this Sub-Committee of the Departmental Committee. It will be considered with the whole general question.

As far as Gola is concerned there are two landing places there already, one in the east and one to the south-west, built by the Land Commission a few years ago out of the Relief Vote. There is no constructed landing place in the islands of Innishmeane and Innisherrer. There is a rough landing place built by the islanders themselves except for a bit of grouting necessary there and which will be considered. In the same way at Inishtrahull there is no landing place but a survey has already been made there. It is ridiculous to be asking for inspectors to be sent round inspecting things already inspected and where there is sufficient information at the disposal of the Department already. The whole position there is known. These with various other applications for minor marine works along the coast will have to be considered by the Sub-Committee. Until that Sub-Committee reports I intend to put up no minor marine works to the Department of Finance. One must lay down definite lines of procedure and visualise the problem as a whole, so that you know exactly what you want and what you are tending to and where you are going when tackling that problem. I prefer, therefore, to wait for this report to enable us to be in that position. Many of the piers built by the old Congested Districts Board never had a boat brought alongside them. These were built in the past, I do not know why. Local influence, or one thing or another, was brought to bear on the Congested Districts Board and, possibly, reasons were put up which, one might say, fooled the Congested Districts Board and a lot of public money was spent. That was all very well in those days, but you cannot do that nowadays. We must see when public money is spent that the work done is going to be of use to the people of the locality, that we are not merely coming to the relief of the locality by doing some kind of work that is of no use. As far as the islands of Gola, Innishmeane and Innisherrer are concerned they will be considered. Their cases will come in with other applications to the Sub-Committee. So far as the mainland is concerned, I am satisfied that no case has been made out for the extension of the facilities already there.

Mr. Cassidy

I should like to be allowed to correct one misstatement or false assumption that the Minister has made. He made reference to the fact that I referred to the Congested Districts Board. I did and I said that the Congested Districts Board devoted more money to Donegal than the Minister's Department had ever done. The Minister then endeavoured to assume and assumed erroneously that I wanted the British back. The Minister knows that that is an infernal untruth and if he was a gentleman he would have the courage to withdraw it.

The Dáil adjourned at 11 p.m. until 3 p.m. on Thursday.