The Irish fishing industry looks set to be devastated in 2026 as fishing opportunities will be severely reduced.
Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine, Timmy Dooley, brought the results of the EU’s AGRIFISH Council, to Dáil Éireann just before the Christmas break.
Reports suggest that the severe reduction in fishing opportunities could cost over 2,300 jobs in coastal regions, leaving Waterford’s historic fishing industry devastated.
Mickey Foley, a skipper who fishes from Duncannon, on the Waterford Estuary, spoke to The Munster Express about the 2026 quota cuts, which he described as a huge “disaster all around”.
“It has never been this bad,” he said. “There is a lot of focus on the mackerel, it’s the 1,500 other boats that are going to be hit the hardest.”
“The inshore fishermen use pots to catch lobsters and crab, they have to put mackerel in their pots as bait. All of that is going to double in price. They won’t financially sustain it. If another round of decommissioning comes, I could see lots of the bigger boats taking it too,” said Mr. Foley.
Mr. Foley was clear about what this meant for fishing families. “My family is fishing since before the start of records, back in 1864. I’m fishing 42 years myself. They have never come back from Brussels with good news. They tell us the quota might be cut by 40% and then when it gets cut by 20% they act like we’ve got a good deal,” he said.
“I couldn’t see my grandchildren going into fishing. The government has sold out the industry. My own son, Dean, fished with me for a few years, and I told him to stop and get a trade instead. I could see then there was no future in it.”
Mr. Foley and his crew caught a 600lb bluefin tuna in the water off Dunmore East before Christmas. This is a by-catch, an accidental catch, and Irish fishermen cannot enter bluefin Tuna into international markets even when they are caught in Irish waters.
“There was a guy I knew,” said Mr. Foley, “who caught a bluefin tuna off Baltimore in Cork. Angling boats can only tag and release tuna, so that’s what he did.
“The same fish was caught a couple of months later in the Bay of Biscay by a French boat. They sold that fish at auction for €36,000!
“We cannot even fish our own water,” Mr. Foley added.
Villages decimated
“The villages are decimated,” said Sean Doherty, a campaigner and fisherman from a longstanding fishing family in Checkpoint. “Fishing gave meaning to the villages of Waterford.
“A whole generation of people left school early because fishing was booming. They went without qualifications to learn their trade, but they have a very specialised skill-set with specialised knowledge,” Mr. Doherty told The Munster Express.
“If you’re a carpenter you can do something else, make bird boxes and go sell them, but it’s very hard to find good work for people who’ve fished for 10 or 15 years, who can mend nets and navigate and do all the rest,” Mr. Doherty said.
“Within 20 years it’s hard to see independent boats operating any more. It’s hard to see how the next generation could see anything there for them. That’s a huge loss of cultural knowledge, generation-to-generation, it’s in the blood.”
Mr. Doherty added: “But, we can never turn our back on fishing, that’s important to remember. It has gone through hard times before and it can come back”.
The AGRIFISH Council brings together ministers from each EU member state, as it adopts legislation on fisheries policy, sets the annual Total Allowable Catches (TACs) and quotas for each species, and oversees the allocation of fishing opportunities generally.
Speaking in Dáil Éireann, Minister Dooley outlined the results of the December AGRIFISH Council, saying “They advised 70% reduction in the total allowable catch for mackerel [this] is compounded by a 41% reduction in blue whiting, a 22% reduction in boarfish and further reductions in nephrops or Dublin Bay prawns as they are known …”
“Ireland’s fishing opportunities for 2026 amount to approximately over 120,000 tonnes with an estimated first-sale value of €205 million. This represents a decrease of one third – €100 million to €105 million – on the estimated value of the 2025 quota.”
Sinn Féin Councillor Pat Fitzgerald spoke to The Munster Express about his experiences as a former fisherman from Dunmore East. In his early days Cllr. Fitzgerald dedicated himself to investigating the fishing matter in Brussels and at fishing conferences.
“Access to our renewable food source has been taken from us,” said Cllr. Fitzgerald.
“I think this could mean the industry will go,” he said regarding the 2026 quotas. “Generally it’s hard to see how they will survive this.
“And this has come by the salami slice, one small piece at a time, year by year it has gotten worse.”
Cllr. Fitzgerald also highlighted the loss of cultural and knowledge.
“We’re becoming an island nation ignorant of nautical knowledge, a lot of that would have been learned in and survived through fishing. Something like tourism can never replace that,” he added.
Sinn Féin Councillor John Hearne told The Munster Express that this goes to the core of the culture that Irish governments are supposed to protect.
“Who would have thought the Brits couldn’t wipe out a way of life in Ireland, with all its culture and traditions, but the Irish government have done it to fishing,” Cllr. Hearne said.
“Belgium has a smaller coastline than Waterford, but it has more access to Irish fish than Ireland does. That’s how wrong it is.”
Chair of the Oireachtas Fisheries and Maritime Affairs Committee, Sinn Féin TD for Waterford, Conor D. McGuinness, said that this amounts to the most severe shock the Irish fishing industry has ever faced.
“It was not a sudden collapse, it was the final shove in a long process of decline that Government parties managed, excused and normalised. What was already fragile has now been pushed dangerously close to a point of no return. That is the responsibility of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and successive administrations,” Deputy McGuinness said.
Ireland are set to have the Presidency of the EU from July 1 to December 31. Deputy McGuinness says this is the opportunity for government to finally stand up for the fishing industry and demand changes to ensure it survives.
“Our fishing communities have observed decades of loss. They have been patient and have played by the rules. Their anger, despair and disappointment is justified,” he said.
“The injury is real, the insult is undeniable and what happens next will tell us whether this Government is prepared to stand up for this country or whether it is content to let another vital sector slide towards a fatal end,” Deputy McGuinness added.
The Hague Preferences
2026 looks set to be worse than any other year in the Irish fishing industry as Ireland’s Hague Preferences have been blocked at EU level.
As European Movement Ireland explains, the November 1976 Hague Preferences allowed Ireland to take a larger share of some fish stocks if those stocks fall below a certain level.
Ireland tried to invoke the Hague Preferences for 2026 but was blocked at EU level by a group led by France and Germany, involving the Netherlands, and supported by Poland.
TD Rose Conway-Walsh described the Hague Preferences as the mechanism that was supposed to guarantee Ireland a minimum level of fish from its own waters.
TD Pádraig Mac Lochlainn said The Hague Preferences were supposed to be what the EU gave Ireland for access to its fishing stock. “They were in place for Ireland and Britain as a quid pro quo for access to our waters,” said TD Mac Lochlainn.
“Our waters have given huge wealth to fishing fleets across Europe. They are some of the richest fishing waters in the world. The Hague preferences are central to that,” he said.
“That was a veneer of fairness and it was deployed from time to time over the years where necessary. To suggest that the Hague preferences can just be done away with is absolutely unacceptable.”
Minster Dooley described the blocking of what amounts to Ireland’s emergency guaranteed catch in its own waters as an act of betrayal from other EU members.
“I am extremely disappointed that these member states have chosen to block the protection of our fleet at our time of most need,” the minister said.
“I said at the Council I felt it was comparable to an act of betrayal by colleagues of the fundamental terms and conditions of an insurance policy that is being paid for in fish by Ireland since 1983.
“It is particularly upsetting that the charge has been led by those who benefited most from access to Irish waters every year since 1983.”
The Impact
Notably, Minister Dooley explained that the potential for Irish waters remains strong.
“While the overall scale of opportunity remains substantial, the distribution of quota across key stocks presents ongoing challenges for fleet planning, processing throughput and coastal communities that are highly dependent on specific fisheries.”
The Minister also explained the scientific advice is not to blame. Only two fishing stocks, sole and plaice, in a water area known as 7bc, are purely in the control of the EU. All other stocks are shared with countries outside of the EU. These countries set their own quotas, which can go far beyond scientific advice.
“It is important that we do not focus our ire on the scientific advice here. The advice is merely reflecting years of overfishing by other countries and we, the EU and specifically Ireland are suffering the consequences,” said Minister Dooley. “… overfishing by some third countries has led to the collapse of the stock”.
And this, it seems, will not change.
“Even since the Council last week, we have seen questionable actions taken by other third countries in how we manage the mackerel stock in the north-east Atlantic,” said Minister Dooley, pointing out that recently, Norway, Britain, the Faroes and Iceland “agreed, without the EU, on management arrangements for mackerel for 2026”.
TD Paul Lawless summed up what the real life situation facing the Irish fleet.
“I spoke to a fisherman yesterday who said his vessel will be docked in the harbour while he watches the Germans and the French come in with their vessels, take our fish and load their articulated trucks and go back to Europe. That is what is happening,” he said, adding it was “unacceptable”.
Funded by the Local Democracy Reporting Scheme
AARON KENT
