Vol. 403 No. 9
18 Mr. Connor asked the Minister for the Marine when he intends to respond positively to the requests from the Shannon Regional Fishery Board for permission to fill vacant posts of fishery development officer on Lough Ree, the Upper Shannon to Lough Gara and on the River Suck made vacant by retirements in recent years.
The staffing levels of all the fisheries boards, not just the Shannon, have fallen significantly in recent years due to general restrictions on recruitment.
It would, in present financial circumstances, be totally unrealistic to expect that there would be any general relaxation of these restrictions or any general increase in the staffing of the fisheries boards.
At the same time, I am very conscious of the need to maintain a balance in the staffing of the boards and to ensure that a limited number of priority posts are filled. In this regard I have ordered my Department to carry out an assessment of the staffing position in all the boards. I cannot comment on any individual cases until such time as the assessment has been completed and I have had the chance to study it.
