The publication yesterday of the Common Fisheries Policy Proposals for reform will spell the end for the Irish fishing industry and finally kill off our coastal communities, Donegal TD Thomas Pringle said today.
The Killybegs based TD said: “The proposal to privatise fish quotas will make all the other seemingly positive proposals irrelevant if they go ahead.
“The EU continues to show us where their priorities lie- with the powerful nations in the fishing industry and small countries like Ireland will be thrown to the wolves once again.”
Mr Pringle said that the minister is quoted as saying “I have no doubt that this would lead to concentration of fishing into the hands of large fishing international companies without links to the coastal communities and these very large fishing vessels, in some cases factory ships, would no longer land into Ireland resulting in loss of jobs, closure of fish-processing factories and economic activity in our coastal communities”.
The Donegal Deputy added: “I am calling on the minister to outline clearly now what the government can do to stop this crazy so called reform of the CFP.
“It is not enough to say we will negotiate, he has to clarify have we a veto and if he will use it. The CFP has been a form of economic war that has cost Ireland dear in terms of jobs and fisheries conservation.
“A whole way of life and part of a valuable heritage has been destroyed by decades of predatory control from Brussels”.
