Fishing Quotas: Statements Dail Éireann — 2026-02-24 ============================================================ Pat the Cope Gallagher (FF), Donegal -----who told me many times that they did not want to exceed the quotas because then they were selling black fish, which brings down the price of the others. They are honourable people who get very little funding from the State when they go out to buy their boats and provide employment. It is so sad to look at the ports where I worked and processed fish. I processed fish in ports from Clogherhead to Dunmore East to Cobh to Castletownbere and up the coast to Rossaveal, Killybegs and Burtonport and on the Isle of Man. The people I saw were all hard-working individuals, but there is an attitude to them in the Department and at SFPA level. Any Deputy who is a member of the committee will realise that there seems to be such an attitude towards fishermen. As long as I am here, I will stand up for the interests of fishermen. Fishermen invest heavily. I hope the task force that the Minister of State has established with the support of his colleagues in government is not a box-ticking exercise. There must be positive results coming from that. The industry has gone through very difficult times, but this is the worst period I have seen in my lifetime. There is a real question as to how the European Commission allowed four countries to cancel the Hague preferences is a real question. Where the Minister of State finds himself is a lonely place to be. I have been there and done that. You are fighting an uphill battle. The Minister of State tried his utmost to secure the support of other countries to ensure that the Hague preferences would not be cancelled. The Commission has a duty to protect small member states. What occurred in Brussels before Christmas breaches 50 years of good practice and good faith. How can we and the sector have confidence in the Commission? I have heard some people suggest that we should await the review of the CFP. I would not be holding my breath. I have been there and done that at the fisheries committee when I was its vice president. I led delegations to Iceland. There was a time I thought that the Commission and Commissioner Damanaki were representing Iceland. She was doing more to support Iceland than she was to represent the country she was appointed to represent as a member of the Commission. I would have to make the political charge that the Danish presidency was not impartial and did not assist Ireland. I do not know whether or not this has been done but I again recommend that a letter of protest be sent by the Minister of State or, if necessary, the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade to the President of the Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, to express our disappointment at the way we were treated last year. Let us be positive, look ahead and say that the Minister of State has our support with a view to ensuring that the task force will take all the elements into consideration. I believe some time, but not that much, will be needed to come up with proposals before they are finalised. Everybody in the industry should have an input into that. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-02-24/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:40+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-02-24