Debate contribution: Fishing Industry: Ardglass

Debate contribution by Mr Robbie Butler on 26 November 2024.

MLA

Mr Robbie Butler

Party at the time

Ulster Unionist Party

Date

26 November 2024

Type

Debate contribution

Business

Adjournment

Heading

Fishing Industry: Ardglass

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4677693

Read the official Assembly record

Text

I thank the Member for South Down for securing this important Adjournment debate. I will start with some slightly different words. I am sure that Members can think of childhood memories. I will recall one of mine, because it provides important context as to why I want to speak on this issue. In 1982, I was in P7. My school trip was one of the only holidays that I got. That year, the school trip happened to be to Ardglass. A class of P7s stayed in a school somewhere there. We bunked down. I have very little memory of it, apart from it being a lovely, quaint little village. One other thing stood out: a visit to Angus Cochrane's fishery. It was incredible. What an experience for a child to go into a fish hall bustling with workers shifting crates of fish, ice and all sorts of things. A theme that ran throughout the factory floor was the generosity of everybody who worked there, and Mr Cochrane in particular. That busload of young children left the fish hall with a bit of an education, bags of fish and memories that would last a lifetime. When I looked through what had happened in the intervening period, I was sad to see that Angus Cochrane's factory had to close in the 2000s. The challenges that our fisheries sector faces are not new.

It is an industry like no other, and I am sure that, like me, you probably watched the programmes about the job that they do when they go out in their boats into the treacherous deep waters, sometimes at night and often overnight. It is a really dangerous job, but it is a job that many people take for granted, because we see our fish in the shop and sometimes do not even know where it has come from. Those people, who genuinely risk life and limb to provide really good food on our tables, deserve not just our words but our actions.

There are quite a few pressures facing our industry at the moment. They have been named, but I will go over them just to reinforce my position, as Chair of the AERA Committee, that we are here, we are listening and we will ensure that this is tabled back through the Committee. The first issue is the skilled worker visas. I thank Members from that Committee — some of them are here today — who have reinforced that issue. It is a significant issue, and we have the same issue with mushroom pickers. Particularly with seasonal workers in fisheries, it is a damning indictment that we cannot, because it is a reserved matter, action that. I will also point to political failure, because that is another example of how, when this place is not working properly, we do not have the vires to even lobby effectively at Westminster. We have non-sitting MPs, and, when we are not sitting here, it is as good as non-sitting MLAs, because there is no voice for the sector. I hope that the Minister will speak to this, because it is right and proper. We have talked about food security in the last number of weeks, particularly in and around the agricultural space. We will be talking about horticulture in the Committee shortly and fisheries; they are intrinsically linked. There is a food security circle, and fisheries are absolutely part of that, even more so because, let us face it, fish is good for you. There is more that we can do to encourage people to eat fish, and we should. However, to do that, we will have to ensure that that food security is part of what we are talking about here today and in the Committee and is part of the Minister's ambition. Part of that will be fleet modernisation. Many Members have pointed to the fact that it is a dangerous job. One of the ways that we can ensure that we equip and keep our fishermen — fisher people — safe is to ensure that the fleet that they have is not just modern but equipped to the levels that it should be. As Miss McIlveen pointed out, it is about the modern technologies and sourcing to ensure that they are as efficient as possible in their actions when fishing and to ensure that they are competitive in the global market. This is not just about catching for local purposes but about ensuring that they are globally competitive. We also have to have an eye on the environment, and, as has rightly been pointed out, those things are not mutually exclusive. At times, a lot of the innovation that we can see will bring benefits to what we are doing. We were in Loughry college last week, and one of the innovative practices that people there are looking at is how to harvest prawn meat better from shells that would be binned and probably cast aside. We will hopefully hear from the Minister about that circular economy. We can do this only if there is a sustainable and resilient workforce in our harbours, whether that is in Ardglass, Kilkeel or Portavogie, and it is absolutely incumbent on us to be loud and clear today that we are speaking for an industry that faces unprecedented challenge. It has been here before, but it cannot last. We hope that, today, the Minister can shed some light on what the Department's ambitions will be to help us achieve that.

918 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 11:36 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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