Fishermen protest as jobs under threat

national | rights, freedoms and repression | news report

Friday June 06, 2008 01:32

by Paula Geraghty

mspgeraghty at yahoo dot ie

Fishermen from Downings in Donegal to Kilmore Quay in Wexford and beyond took part in a national protest at the Dáil today. Angered at rising fuel prices and cheap imports their livlelihoods are under threat.

From Erris to Kilmore Quay, fishermen are protesting in their communities and at the Dail in Dublin at the threats their communities face. Rising fuel prices, fishing quotas followed with really cheap imports has resulted in protests including fisher men giving away free fish on O'Connel Bridge last weekend. Tomorrow the Irish Fisherman's Federation a new organisation which has united Fishermen who work in Ireland has promised to sell fish at wholesale prices at ports around the country on Friday to highlight the difference in what fishermen get paid and what consumers are forced to pay. In Galway fishermen will meet at eyre Square to sell their fish at cost price from noon.

It was quite clear that fishermen would follow the French and reject the EU treaty.

Placards read 'we're not criminals' and 'Third world starves as ireland dumps dead fish', highlighting the inequalities and inefficiencies of globalisation.

The fishermen marched upto the department of Agriculture and deposited a box of frozen fish to highlight the worthlessness of their work.

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Comments (7 of 7)

Reality please

by Jim

Fri Jun 06, 2008 11:07

Irish consumers want choice.
Taxpayers do not want their hard earned money taken from them and giving to people who cannot stay afloat.
Why should the market be artificially destorted to protect uncompetitive and loss-making fishermen?
If fishermen cannot make a living in the fishing business they should find another business they can make a living from.
The same goes for any other industry.
If you can't stand the heat get out of the kitchen.
The same goes for any industry whether it is agriculture, industry, transport or technology.

There should be a level playing field

Fri Jun 06, 2008 11:15

Special interests should not have the ear of governments to bring in laws and policies that favour there interests over others.
For decades Irish farmers found that they had no market for their goods in ireland.
Instead of accepting the economic reality that they should find another livelihood, the instead got the EU to give them subsidies and grants to make up for their profit shortfall, while their surpluses were bought up by governments, kept in storage and either sold on the cheap to Third World markets while denying their farmers to sell in Europe or else mountains of wheat and lakes of wine were dumped.
The prices of food was kept artificially high to keep the farmers in business.
Now fishermen expect to be given special treatment.
They threaten to blockade our ports, disrupting the international trade of industries who do not get a dig out by the government, so they can be blanketed in cotton wool.
Every other industry must factor high fuel costs in their operations.
But like a bunch of crybabies behind their mother's apron fishermen, farmers and other special interests get a dig out.

My advice?

Sell you boats for scrap and get back to education and get yourself jobs in some other sector.

Fish factory worker

by Sian

Fri Jun 06, 2008 16:55

To those of you who know nothing about fishing:
Fishermen paid thousands of euros , in cases even millions of euros to buy their boats and the required licences. In many cases as recently as 2004 they were actually encouraged by the government to buy boats. However, the department of Marine did not go to Europe to get quotas for these boats, letting foreign boats take 80% of our fish. Now Irish fishermen have to throw back fish at a time when we need to sell everything to pay for the fuel. That is why fishermen are so angry. The real issue is the sell out by our own government. If you have a farm you can sell it. If you have a fishing boat, you owe the bank hundreds of thousands and it is impossible to sell. That is why the fishermen need support, at least in the short term. The government got them into the mess, and now they are ignoring it.

food

by lulu

Sat Jun 07, 2008 11:02

Also, it's a matter of vital food supplies to the nation, not just a question of changing jobs to suit the market. We need people producing a range of food here in order to avoid dependence on imports. Despite the apparent wealth & ability of consumers of the Western world to buy the latest gadget or fashion, the possibility of famine is about 40 days away.

200 BILLION

by Catherine

Sat Jun 07, 2008 12:44

It is estimated that the overall contribution of the fishing industry TO the EU since 1973 is €200 BILLION - that figure makes Ireland a net contributor to the EU in line with Germany.

This should be noted in the lead-up to Thursday's referendum when the whine from Cowen is that we should crawl into the voting booth and scratch a 'yes' to the paymaster bureaucrats in Brussels.

WRONG - they owe us.

Successive rotten Irish governments bartered the fishing industry for self interest - more votes to be got from farmers than fishermen.

fish sales

by elizabeth

Sat Jun 07, 2008 16:06

The fishermen never got any 'hand outs'. They invest huge sums. They are hunted down like common criminals by our own navy and the ultra aggressive SFPA. They are the only fishermen being policed in Irish territorial waters. They risk life and limb every day. This is the first time most of us have seen them protest. There are very few of them left.
This industry did not depend on foreign investment.
They are not over paid bureaucrats.
They are not property speculators.
They are employed in one of the only god given assets this island has.
SUPPORT THEM. They deserve our support just as much as many other categories of non producing idlers this country has produced. And while you are at it, vote No to Lisbon, and lobby for a better deal for fishermen.

Market failure

by billy idle

Sun Jun 08, 2008 01:53

Yeah the market's great Jim - $140 oil and and plenty of Irish job loss's.

This so-called cheaper fish is actually EU subsidised fish caught by factory ships who are currently hoovering up the entire fishery resources of already impoverished West African states.

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Fishermen protest as jobs under threat

Comments (7 of 7)