I am glad to get the opportunity to talk about this very serious matter. When we talk about fishermen, we are talking about an awful lot of people. We are talking about coastal communities and people who depend on it so much to eke a living. It is often dangerous and contrary. People have gone through a lot to put the fleets that they have together. To think that in some room somewhere with a stroke of a pen that we can destroy up to 2,300 jobs in the fishing industry in our own country is one of the most serious things that has happened since I came to Dáil Éireann in 2016. I might be a small bit away from the sea, but I am not that far. I have known all my life people like Michael Orpen and all those people who did so much to employ people from Castletownbere all the way over along and down into Cahersiveen and back to Dingle. So many people have given so much to the industry and employed so many people. This is going to finish us altogether. People were not happy with the fishing they had. It is about three years since I have seen a mackerel. We know for a long time that something has gone wrong and now this complicates it further. I am telling the Minister and Minister of State that we cannot accept this. They will have to pull out all the stops whatever it takes. It will not do to do it here. They have go into whatever room this is decided in and threaten them with everything. We have more miles of seashore in our little country. It was one of the biggest industries we had. It was actually the English who taught us how to fish back in the 1600s. We complained about them a lot over the years but this is one of the good things they did but we have let it go and that is not satisfactory in their eyes, my eyes or anyone's eyes. To think that there will be foreign vessels fishing off our shores and fellas will be standing on the seashore looking out at them is not fair. I am asking the Minister and the Minister of State to ensure that they work together with the Taoiseach, the Tánaiste and all the Ministers to ensure that whatever veto they can use is used or whatever they can do is done because their fate and our fate will be decided if this is going to be the end result of it. We have had the short straw since we joined the European Union but this is cause enough for me anyway to say that we will have to withdraw from a lot of their carry-on if we are going to lose our own fishing waters. Since we joined the EU, we have not had the benefit of them totally like we should have had. We saw a demonstration when we were in the convention centre during Covid. The fishing fleet came up the river and represented themselves so correctly and so properly. Nobody had the one story. The fishermen all had their own different stories and they were very interesting to listen to. Sadly, whatever has happened now has superseded all that for the worse. It is not good enough for people. When fishermen are affected, many coastal communities are affected. Everyone was getting a bit out of it, including the shopkeeper, the publican, the garage, fitters and the small processors. This is going to be devastating. The one thing I was very proud of was seeing lorry after lorry coming from Castletownbere going up through our village in the dark of night and maybe going down again in the middle of the night. They seem to operate at night because the road is so bad, they can see the lights and it is safer it for them to travel at night. We appreciate them for the work they have been doing diligently and without any error. It is nothing that Ireland has done. We have not let Europe down but we are being taken to the cleaners. Christmas Day is coming. It will be here in less than a week but the Minister and the Minister of State cannot sit down during that time. They have to ensure they put a strategy in place to teach them a lesson that they cannot come into Irish waters. We own them. That is the starting point. They should only be let in if we let them in. They should be threatened with whatever bit of artillery we have because it is our property, our coastline, our jobs and our people who are being affected. It is time that we stood up and took no more of their bull because that is what they are giving us. They are giving us nothing and we are just begging for everything - begging for the derogation and begging for Mercosur. We are entitled to live as well as the Brazilians or anyone else that is interfering with our markets. They are interfering with our commodity here in fish that has been cleaned out and we just stand idly by. That cannot happen. I am asking the Minister and the Minister of State to work together to ensure that it does not happen. I welcome the gentlemen in the Public Gallery. They are concerned and we are all concerned with them. We have to stand with them. We have to do something more drastic than what we are doing because we have not been good enough up to now. We were taken to the cleaners and I am asking the Government to put an end to it once and for all. This is more serious than any other thing that has happened in the past 15 or 20 years because we were bad enough up until then but now we have been cleaned out altogether. I am very upset about this. It is a very serious matter for people whose lives depend on it.

Sentiment score: -0.04