Castlemaine SAC IFI response to Oireachtas Debate and EU Commision
Please read the IFI response to recent questions I have asked them through the Petitions Committee in the Oireachtas. They haven't answered anything in my opinion in these answers. Lets take the first question about the 1400 spring Salmon in 2018. The fish counter by their own admission was out of order for a lot of the spring period in 2018. 1400 Salmon in the spring period is not accurate and they have to prove it. They said they are telling the difference between sea trout and salmon by CCTV but the counts are not verified. You couldn't make it up. I will be preparing within the 2 week period I have to send back further questions on all the answers they gave back and I have another ten questions to put to them. Also I have got a response from the EU stating that they are now looking into the case also because they see this as a violation of EU law. It's very simple, Salmon has to be counted professionally and data needs to be collected accurately! How you do this is not of my concern but you cannot go with figures that you are not 100 percent certain of. Jotting down in logbooks is not accurate data! Dot's on a screen showing something going over a fish pass is not accurate data. We need to get this right and stop blaming other problems for the decline in salmon stocks when we can't get the simple things right here first. I have no doubt this will take years yet but I truly believe we have the capacity to get this right.