I move:—
That a sum not exceeding £93,470 be granted to complete the sum necessary to defray the Charge which will come in course of payment during the year ending the 31st day of March, 1949, for Salaries and Expenses in connection with Sea and Inland Fisheries, including a Grant-in-Aid.
I think it may be best before going into details of this Estimate to say a general word on the broad policy which I conceive it to be the duty of the Department of Fisheries to pursue in this country. I believe the prime function of the Department of Fisheries is to maintain and defend against all interests the livelihood of the inshore fishermen along our coasts. I conceive it to be the duty of my Department to ensure that no vested interest, foreign or domestic, will pursue its own end at the expense of the livelihood of our inshore fishermen. I do not want for a moment to conceal from the House that that aim in certain circumstances imposes at times a modest burden on the consumer of fish; but, if such burden should occur, I am satisfied that a consistent adherence to this policy will tend to reduce it as time goes on. Many interested parties conceive it to be a desirable thing to promote the trawling industry in this country. With my present understanding of this problem, founded on five years' representation of the County of Donegal and an intimate contact with the fishermen of that county during that period and ten years' interest in these problems since, I am satisfied that we must make our choice between establishing a trawling industry in this country and preserving the inshore fishermen—for we cannot have both. If we are to have an efficient trawling company, that trawling company can supply not only the total demand of our domestic market but a very substantial export trade as well; and I am not going to ask the fishermen on our coast to become a charge on public charity.
If there were an efficient trawling company operating in this country there would be no need for the inshore fishermen, and the only basis upon which they could remain in existence would be as a charge on the general community. They are not that kind of men. I do not believe, even if we asked them to accept that status, that they would be prepared to accept it. And even though we were ready to provide money artificially to keep their industry in existence, they just would not accept it; they would turn their hands to other work. Then an industry which constitutes, in my opinion, an essential element in a way of life that I believe it is valuable and desirable to preserve for our people, would be destroyed, and that way of life could no longer continue. Therefore, I am constrained to present all and sundry with notice that, so long as I retain the confidence of this House as the Minister for Fisheries, there will be no trawling company in this country; that is, in the accepted sense of the word, a commercial trawling company with a fleet of deep-sea trawlers.
There is in existence a kind of quasi-trawling company which operates from this city, and this problem arises in connection with that. There are a number of wholesale merchants in the fish business in this country. That trawling company, provided its activities do not go further than they have gone so far, is not inconsistent with the maintenance of a prosperous livelihood for the inshore fishermen, because it is really a kind of a compliment to call it a trawling company. I would be prepared to see such a company continue to function, provided it was not a monopoly in the hands of one fish wholesaler. I am prepared to see it maintained as the co-operative activity of all the recognised fish wholesalers; that is to say, that all would have a share in the enterprise and all would equally share the benefits of the enterprise. I would consider a proposal that it should be run by the Sea Fisheries Association as an ancillary activity to the inshore fishermen's industry, or I would be prepared to see it suspend its operations. But there is one basis upon which I do not think it may be properly continued in being, and that is as a reserve monopoly.
Some Deputies might say: "Why do you want to interfere with them at all?" The only justification I have for suggesting that we should is that if we allow one trawling company in private hands we ought to allow every private individual who wants to start a trawling company to start it. I will not let anyone start a big commercial trawling company based on this country because I believe it would destroy the livelihood of the inshore fishermen and, therefore, without in any way wanting to be draconian or precipitate or dictatorial, I put the circumstances to the House and implicitly to the trawling company concerned, with no desire whatever unduly to interfere with the limitations of the individual interests. It is the policy of the Department to have no trawling company in competition with the inshore fishermen. The position of that company must be altered from a monopolistic one into one in which all those who have an interest in the wholesale fish business would have an equal share, or it must come to an end.
Now, supposing we accept the position that no big trawling company is to provide a surplus of fish, we are then faced with the situation that the inshore fishermen, while they will provide generally an ample supply and variety of fish for our domestic market, will, on occasion, as the result of ungovernable weather, be unable to land fish for a week or maybe a fortnight, and we are confronted with a hiatus which the consumer is entitled to expect will be filled so that he will have a supply of fish when weather makes it impossible for the inshore fishermen to make their regular deliveries. The only workable method I see out of that difficulty is to authorise the Sea Fisheries Association on those rare occasions to go to Grimsby or one of the large centres of fish supply abroad, bring in sufficient fish to fill the hiatus and auction it off amongst all the wholesalers so that all can have an equal share of it for their trade in the knowledge that there will be no intention to maintain that irregular procedure but as a device merely to fill the gap when weather makes it impossible for the inshore fishermen to supply fish.
I am not fanatical on any of the methods I here outline and I am quite open to the suggestion of a better method than the one I am suggesting of achieving the fundamental objective, and that is that this market will be reserved for the inshore fishermen and that no interference, foreign or domestic, will be allowed to override that prime desideratum.
Now I come to the question of inland fisheries and I have an immense amount of technical information here, the broad heads of which I will deal with briefly. Under the 1939 Fishery Act, there was a proviso that at a certain stage the riparian rights to net fresh water rivers would be extinguished by the State on the basis of compensation. Those sections of that Act are now coming into operation and there have been some places where there has been misunderstanding and uneasiness when those who had a right to net those fresh water rivers were told they might no longer do so. Some of them do not realise that if that right is withdrawn from them the Act provides that the value of the right they have been called upon to surrender has to be fixed by an independent arbitrator and that whatever figure he fixes they must receive, and if they are not pleased with his settlement that they should have a right of appeal.
Therefore I would invite Deputies to whom constituents may come in perplexity in that matter to reassure them and advise them, wherever possible, to constitute themselves into a group of riparian owners seeking compensation for their loss of rights under this Act and to retain the service of an independent solicitor to represent them in the arbitration, and from that on the solicitor will take charge of the negotiations for them and they need have no anxiety that substantial and generous justice will not be done to their claim.
There is not the slightest desire on the part of this Government—and I think I can speak with confidence on behalf of the Government responsible for passing the Act, our predecessors —to treat these riparian owners in any niggardly or ungenerous way. It was the purpose of those who drafted the Act, as it is the purpose of this Government, that they should be fairly, or even generously treated. It will be our constant aim to ensure that no person, who has rights under the Act, will leave the arbitration with a legitimate feeling of grievance or hardship.
I know that there will be Deputies here who will have a word to say about the Sea Fisheries Association, and I should like to anticipate these words by recalling to the minds of those who have been interested in this question over a long time, the comparative position of our inshore fishermen to-day with the condition in which they found themselves two or three years after the previous Great War. The inshore fishermen during the 1914-1918 war made a lot of money and they bought boats, they went into debt and they took a very optimistic view of the future. Not many years had passed until practically everyone of them was hopelessly insolvent.
Efforts were made to collect debts from them and their boats were abandoned, valuable gear was thrown away and the whole fishing industry was thrown into a state of confusion, into something approximating to despair. Out of that came the Sea Fisheries Association and a whole new concept of allowing a group of men to get advances for the provision of boats and gear and to permit them to repay out of the proceeds of their several catches, with the result that the majority of the fishermen have come into the post-war period, free of debt, and with equipment mostly in good order, albeit there is a difficulty in procuring the things that require replacing. While I do not suppose that we can ever hope that they will grow immensely rich, most of them are reasonably comfortable and are getting along. There has been a difficulty in getting nets but nets are being procured.
Deputy Flynn will be interested to hear that Kelvin engines were not forgotten when we were in London. We had even the Chancellor of the Exchequer concerned to look for Kelvin engines for us. Negotiations are going on but they are a tough lot, the same bunch, and it is hard to get engines out of them. Danish engines are available but they are expensive and I do not think that people like them. Deputies may rest assured that the Sea Fisheries Association are doing all in their power constantly, not only to get engines for the fishermen but to get the kind of engines that the fishermen want.
As Deputies are aware, in the fish business from the fishermen to the consumer there is a very wide variety, a surprisingly wide variety, of interests of one kind or another and their various claims and imagined rights not infrequently collide, loudly and resoundingly. Amongst them all, so far as my study of the problem goes, there is one body which is primarily, and as far as I can find out, solely and exclusively concerned with the welfare of the fishermen and that is the Sea Fisheries Association. Therefore, I need hardly tell the House, there is one subject on which all the other interests are loudly and resolutely unanimous and that is that of all the infernal conspiracies and villainies in the country the worst is the Sea Fisheries Association. The matter is very highly technical and the wisest man in the world is the man who is wise enough to know the things he does not know. I do not know the technicalities of the fish trade, so having taken counsel with the exceptionally able and distinguished officers of my Department I determined to set up an advisory council. We ask every interest in the trade, including the trade unions, to name representatives, and I cannot sufficiently thank Father E. J. Coyne, S.J., for undertaking the extremely laborious assignment of being chairman of that advisory committee. Those of us who know of his disinterested and distinguished work in the service of the people of this country will not be surprised to find him in the service of the inshore fishermen as well. It is not everybody who can appreciate the incomparable value of his unique services in the very difficult position of chairman of that council.
A number of contentious points have been referred to that council for deliberation. Some of them are points which I have touched upon this evening. If I had been more discreet perhaps I would simply have said: "I have nothing to say until the committee reports," but I do not know why I should not have said these things because, as I have stated, my mind is closed to none of the questions of method but it is absolutely closed, as I think that most Deputies' minds will be closed, on the fundamental proposition that the fish market of this country belongs primarily to our own fishermen.
So soon as that advisory body reports, I shall consider its recommendations. If I agree with them I shall bring them before the House and ask the House to take any legislative steps that may be necessary to give effect to them. If I do not agree with them, I shall bring them before the House and recommend the House to reject them.
There are two other matters which I should like to mention. One is prospective legislation; the other is the efforts we are making to improve fresh-water fisheries. As Deputies are aware, there are as many theories as there are advisers about how best to increase the brown trout population of any river or lake. One hopefully anticipates the setting up of a hatchery and producing there astronomical numbers of fry, bearing them off in buckets and pouring them into a river only to be told by some wiseacre that one decent pike will eat the whole of them in the course of a day. I believe that is true.
I determined that I would try an experiment the other way round. I know a lake myself where all the coarse fish were removed and now there are no trout in it bigger than about 3½ ounces, and, if you cast three flies over the lake, you will get three 3½-ounce trout out of it, because the trout have multiplied so rapidly and the food has not that the fish do not grow and you get an immense number of very small fish. I have, therefore—and I shall be glad to hear the opinion of Deputies who have interested themselves in this matter—asked my Department to undertake, as an experiment, the trawling of four small lakes and the removal from their waters of approximately 75 per cent. of the coarse fish, with a view to determining if that method would sufficiently stimulate the ordinary course of nature to increase the fish population of the lake and attendant river, while, at the same time, not permitting so rapid an increase in the trout population as to impinge unsatisfactorily on the total available food supply. It may not have any satisfactory results but it may.
Simultaneously, one of our officers is going over to Loch Leven, which is supposed to be one of the best lakes in Scotland for fish propagation and work of that kind, and which, I think, is the centre of the maintenance and development of all the Scottish fisheries. We propose that he should undertake a course of observation to see how things are done there. If any other Deputy has any suggestion to make which he thinks would be of value for the purpose of improving inland fisheries, I shall be very glad to hear it.
I know that I ought to go on to say that if we are going to improve the inland fisheries for the benefit of our neighbours, our neighbours ought to pay something by way of a modest duty on their rods. Never, so long as I am here, will I ask any country or city boy in this country to pay a duty for using a fishing rod. If I could prevail on the lads down the country to go out fishing and to make it a habit, I would be sorely tempted to set up a system of making them a present of a fishing rod. Anything we do here, in any circumstances, should create no deterrent whatever to any citizen of this State enjoying the amenities which God put there for the enjoyment of us all.
The Americans have a very good rule in that regard. It does not matter how rich or how powerful you are, if there is running through your demesne a river with trout in it, every naturalised citizen of the United States of America has a right to cross your wall and proceed to the bank of that river by the shortest course and there to carry on the constitutional right of a United States citizen to fish in a United States river, and nobody can say him nay. There are heavy penalties in America for taking from a river a fish below a certain size and they are very rigorously enforced. I never knew I was as good a runner in my life as on one occasion in Wisconsin on which I was returning from a river and discovered that I had upon my person a fish which might not be expected to measure up to the requirements of the appropriate officer; but, apart from that, so long as I had a fishing rod and wanted to fish, I had the right to cross any man's land by the shortest way to the edge of the lake or river on his property.
I wish we could hope to enforce such a regulation about the size of fish here, but I am a great believer in practical politics. If we made a regulation to-morrow that anybody who took a fish less than six inches out of a river must put it back again, we would simply be making a law which would not be enforced, because we would not be able to enforce it. We must only try to persuade people that they ought not to take fish fry like that and ought not to go out and catch trout fry on bent pins in order to use them as a bait for pike. We ought to try to persuade our people to co-operate with us, in so far as they can, in destroying the vermin which prey upon game fish. They could do a lot to help, if they would, to persuade our people, now that the fish mainly belong to them, that the poacher who fishes out of season is an enemy of the whole community and not of somebody belonging to the landlord class.
I hope I will not shock my more conservative colleagues when I say that I wonder if it will ever be possible here to buy out all the fishing rights on all our rivers. I like the American system. I like the idea that, if God put fish in a river in Ireland, everybody in Ireland, from the smallest to the biggest, has an equal claim to that fish, if he can catch it, and I think it is a reasonable approach. If we accepted that view, it would mean that we would have to acquire the rights vested in certain individuals for a fair compensation and would have to try to grow up in our sense of responsibility, and recognise that, now that it had become the duty of no individual to protect the rivers, it was the duty of us all to protect them and to collaborate with the servants of the State who are charged with the responsibility of seeing that they were not recklessly plundered and ill-used. I wonder could we reasonably look forward to the day when we might legitimately invest public money in such a purchase for the people, in the knowledge that, when we had acquired them for ourselves, we could preserve them for ourselves and for the guests whom we chose to make welcome to that amenity of ours.
It is an ideal towards which I should like to work, but I have no proposals to put before the House now beyond a respectful request that such Deputies as are interested in the matter would fortify me with their opinions on it. If there are any questions any Deputy wishes to ask me in regard to this matter I need hardly say that I shall be only glad to answer them. I think I should perhaps say that, owing to a variety of circumstances, certain imports of smoked fish come in here from Great Britain. I carefully considered that question in relation to our visit to London and came to the conclusion that the most satisfactory way of settling that matter was that we should get the British fish-purchasing authority, who buy cured fish for the British and continental market, to bid us a fair price for a good quantity of our cured fish. It would be an easier way of providing for all legitimate interests. We have approached the appropriate branch of the Ministry of Food and negotiations are still proceeding. I hope we may be able to get —we may not, and it forms no constituent part of any agreement that has been initialled or is to be initialled, being quite a separate negotiation—a satisfactory market for the bulk of our cured fish which would greatly assist our herring industry. I think it is unnecessary for me to add that the Sea Fisheries Association and the resources of the Department are all constantly engaged in trying to find markets for the herring and the mackerel that our people catch but, as Deputies know as well as or better than I do, that is not such an easy job at the present time.
I should also refer to the Killybegs boat-yard. I understand we are going to launch a boat there. I am feeling rather piqued about the launching of the boat because it is going to be launched on the day before an anniversary meeting in Ballingarry. I have been very much drawn between the launching of the boat in Killybegs and the centenary of Ballingarry but I am going to Ballingarry and I will not see the launching of the boat in Killybegs. However, I can assure Deputy Brady that, if I cannot be there in person, I shall be there in spirit. I know he will miss me, as would Deputy Neil Blaney. All of us will have reason to be proud of the amenity now provided at Killybegs and those who enjoy its advantages may well think with warm regard of both the Minister and the Association who were responsible for providing it. I assure all my Fianna Fáil colleagues on the far side, and Deputy McMenamin, that if they make nice speeches paying tributes to my predecessor and to the members of the Sea Fisheries Association for the excellent work that has been done at Killybegs they can, on my behalf, say, "Hear hear"! to each of the several speeches they will make.