The Sea Fisheries Protection Authority (SFPA) was asked to explain why it couldn’t sort out the fish landings row in Killybegs, Co Donegal, at an Oireachtas committee meeting on Wednesday.
“You’ve really significant powers, you’ve attained oversight of the factories with CCTV at an unprecedented level that doesn’t exist anywhere in Europe, you’re seen as the strongest regulator in Europe and we can’t get some solution to what’s going on in Killybegs that’s acceptable,” Sinn Féin fisheries and marine spokesman Pádraig MacLochlainn said.
“You guys have the highest reputation in Europe as regulators,” MacLochlainn continued.
He was addressing SFPA executive chair Paschal Hayes, along with SFPA colleagues Dr Micheál O’Mahony and Olive Loughnane, at a special hearing on the fish landings row held by the Oireachtas agriculture, food and marine committee.
“You have to do your job...you have to make sure there’s not illegal fishing, you have an array of serious powers,” MacLochlainn said.
“Surely we can sort this out, surely we can get to a point where we allow the industry to survive while you do your job which is an important job,” MacLochlainn said.
Responding, Mr Hayes said he was glad Deputy MacLochlainn recognised the important job the SFPA did, but there were parameters within which the agency had to work as a regulator.
“We are willing to discuss with anybody how we can advance in relation to that, keeping in mind that we have legislation from you as the Irish legislator, we have EU regulations that you insist that we implement and we have to keep those functions and issues in mind when we are arriving at a regulatory regime that will underpin the sustainability, the authenticity, and prevent food fraud - to be quite straight about it - within the Irish fishing seafood sector and food sector generally,” Mr Hayes said.
The SFPA had been asked to appear before the parliamentary committee by Independent TD for Cork South-West Michael Collins and colleagues in the continuing row over handling of pelagic fish landings in Killybegs.
Much of the meeting was dominated by technical questions over the background to the dispute, which arose when industry representatives said that three agreed options for checking weighing of landings were reduced to two without notice last March.
Asked by Sinn Fein TD for Donegal Pearse Doherty to explain why two Killybegs fish factories had permits revoked after they handled fish which was landed in Derry to ensure quality, Mr Hayes said that the SFPA was not comfortable discussing individual cases.
Mr Doherty asked Mr Hayes and colleagues to “convince the committee that this was not vindictive”.
Mr Hayes said that this was about sustainability of fish stocks at the end of the day.
In an opening statement running to 30 minutes, Mr Hayes said that it was “with genuine concern” that the SFPA became aware of a “sustained campaign of disinformation and misinformation suggesting the SFPA was not adhering to provisions of the Northern Ireland protocol following the UK departure from the EU”.
“The SFPA confirms that there has been no change in the fish weighing on landing arrangements between the Republic of Ireland and other jurisdictions as a result of Brexit,” it said.
“Under the EU regulations, which SFPA is bound to implement by this Oireachtas, landings to Northern Ireland could never have been weighed in Killybegs under the terms of an Irish 61(1) control plan,” Mr Hayes said.
“That 61(1) derogation is only applicable to post-transport weighing of fishery products when weighed within the member state of landing,” he said.
“The only way in which fishery products might be weighed in Killybegs following a landing to Northern Ireland, would be through a Common Control Programme between UK and Ireland approved by the EU Commission,” he said.
“ It is important to reiterate, no such Common Control Programme has ever existed, either before or after Brexit. Therefore, landings to Northern Ireland are treated similarly to landings in any EU state with which Ireland does not have a Common Control Programme,” he said.
“Irish operators may choose to purchase fish landed to a jurisdiction with which Ireland does not share an approved Common Control Programme, such as Northern Ireland,” he said.
“In such cases, the weighing must have taken place in the landing jurisdiction, either through the default of immediately at landing, or perhaps at a permitted post-transport establishment in that landing territory if a 61(1) control plan exists there,” he said.
“Crucially, however, the weight of the fish upon landing in another jurisdiction must be the weight declared by all parties. Declaration of a weight after transport at a processing facility in the jurisdiction of Ireland is not permitted,” Mr Hayes said.
“Permitting establishments to weigh after transport at a processing facility following a landing in the Republic of Ireland is a significant exemption available under the Interim Fisheries Control Plan
to operators who have the systems to apply such a permit appropriately,” he said.
“The SFPA will not accept the misuse of the weigh after transport system, which has the potential to jeopardise the EU Commission approved exemption for the entire fishing and seafood processing sector. If this exemption is revoked, all landings of pelagic and demersal fish across Ireland could be required to be weighed pierside,” he said.
