Report on Lost at Sea scheme criticised

THE REPORT by Ombudsman Emily O’Reilly on the Lost at Sea scheme was criticised strongly by a former secretary general at the Department of the Marine, Tom Carroll, at an Oireachtas committee.

Mr Carroll told the committee on agriculture, fisheries and food the Ombudsman’s finding that there was maladministration in the set-up of the scheme was harsh and not justified by the facts of the case.

The Ombudsman’s report found a Donegal family had not received fair treatment under a scheme, initiated in 2001 by then minister for the marine Frank Fahey, allotting tonnage quota to families whose fishing vessels were lost at sea.

Francis Byrne, his son Jimmy (16) and three crew members were lost with their fishing vessel in 1981, but Mr Byrne’s family missed the application deadline for the scheme by a year.

Mr Carroll, who is now retired, rejected the Ombudsman’s claim that the scheme was advertised inadequately and her view that the department should have informed more families. He respected the position the Ombudsman had taken but described some contentions in her report as “tenuous” and “not in my opinion soundly based” and suggested she had not presented a strong case.

“I have to say that we have the utmost sympathy for the Byrne family . . . in respect of the terrible tragedy they endured back in 1981,” he said, “but I wish to assure that our motives and stance in this matter should not be seen as showing any lack of concern for their case but rather as the balancing of competing general policy requirements and individual needs where the outcome can often be felt as being harsh in particular circumstances.”

Fine Gael TD PJ Sheehan said the Byrne family should have been informed about the scheme. The department surely had a record of every fishing vessel lost at sea and there could not have been a more genuine case than that of the Byrne family.