Richard Boyd Barrett: EirGrid bullied Dublin Bay fishers - who benefits?

I think the need for these designations to come before the Houses of the Oireachtas is absolutely critical because I don't trust this government not to bully its way through on things that it wants over the legitimate concerns of stakeholders in these decisions. I want to highlight again an instance of this which is very relevant that happened in the last few weeks. Fishers in Dublin Bay who have been fishing for a very, very long time and earning their living have been bullied in the most disgraceful way by Ayr Grid. Because they wanted to do a survey, they basically, without any consultation with the fishers, sent them a notice a week or two before the survey and said, get your fishing pots out of the way, we're doing a survey and if you don't like it, well the consequences were that they were taken to court. The fishers were taken to court and were terrified. These are people, hard-working people, never been in a courtroom in their lives. In their lives, terrified and landed with costs of, I was just talking to one of them just now, it was one of the named people against whom Ayr Grid took the case and they were talking about 80,000 costs being made against these fishers. Now that's outrageous and I raised it a couple of weeks ago in the Dáil because the whole issue, there's supposed to be sort of consultation, right, but to me it shows the high-handed attitude that state bodies can have rather than actually having a process where everybody is heard. Because, you know, under, as I understand EU directives, one imperative to develop offshore renewable wind is not supposed to displace other industries. That's my understanding of European directives in this regard. You're not supposed to displace other people's livelihoods in the process of developing critical infrastructure. And in this case, of course, what's doubly infuriating about it all is these sites for which the state is going to run the infrastructure, the cables and so on, who are going to be the beneficiaries of these developments? Is it the state? Is it the taxpayer? No, it's private companies, private companies, private companies like the French state and other European companies who have got the licenses for a lot of these sites. Sites where the developers decided the sites, they selected the sites. They weren't done on the basis of, because don't get me wrong, we need offshore renewable wind and we need it on the East Coast, but it should be done on the basis of the most appropriate and most suitable sites. And it shouldn't happen at the expense of other people's livelihoods. And it shouldn't happen at the expense of biodiversity and sensitive environments like, for example, the sandbanks, which are very, very rich. They're spawning grounds for the fish, for shellfish and so on. They're also the main area where you get phytoplankton that actually produces oxygen. So one of the main sources of oxygen and one of the main carbon sinks are sandbanks, sandbanks. That's where the phytoplankton that produce oxygen are located. So if you're concerned about protecting marine biodiversity and having the marine protected areas that we should have, but we don't want to designate because you want to give it all away to private developers to make profit out of our natural resources at the expense of biodiversity and at the expense, in this case, of the rights of fishers to continue their livelihood, their traditional livelihood, but you just say, no, no, they can select the sites, we'll put in the infrastructure for them and they'll run away with the profits. That's what's actually going on. And by the way, they have no, there's under no obligation that the supply will come back to us or that we will benefit in terms of the price or anything else for what these private concerns who decided, who selected their own sites and you gave them the right to do it, but we're going to pay for the infrastructure. And where have we heard all this before? See this is happening on sea, but I have a kind of vague memory this happened on land as well. In fact, it's the basis of all the rotten corruption that existed in this country, developer led stuff, right? The developers usually just do anything for the developers. And what do we get out of it in the end? We get, you know, housing that nobody can afford, we get speculation, and the same is going to happen, I suspect, with giving away these sites, right? Because it's wide open for the same kind of speculation. When we put in the infrastructure for them, we drive the fishers out of the way, we short circuit any proper planning process, and they're the beneficiaries, but they don't have to do anything. They don't actually have to do anything. You were leaving it up to them as to whether we will get the offshore renewable energy at all. And they can just sit on it. They can flip it. They don't have to do anything, but you left it in their hands. But we're bending over backwards and we're displacing fishers and we're bullying and threatening them in the courts to the extent that they're fearful that they may lose their houses. That's, to my mind, outrageous. The whole thing is a flippant scandal. And we need to develop offshore renewable wind and renewable energy, but it should be us who is doing it. The beneficiaries should be us, the owners of the sites, the site selection should be based on what is best for Irish society, for the environment, for biodiversity, and the benefits will accrue to the people of Ireland and, for that matter, to the environment, but not to private companies who decide which sites they get and get the wealthy to run away with the profits. But we pay for the infrastructure and we short-circuit the right of stakeholders to actually have any meaningful say in all of this. And if they get in the way, they'll be bullied and threatened. And that's what's happened to the fishers. And that's what's happened to the fishers.