European Commission makes €600 million available for EU fishing fleet

The European Commission will make €600 million available for the EU fishing fleet and their communities affected by the Trade and Cooperation Agreement (TCA) signed between the UK and the EU.

The funds are part of the Brexit Adjustment Reserve worth €5 billion, which was agreed in principle last year and was designed to help Member States deal with the impact of Brexit.

The Irish Government is expected to apply for funds to help the fisheries sector which has been hardest hit by the result of the Brexit negotiations. The EU fleet has been told they will take a cut of 25% of value of their fish caught in UK waters over the next five-and-a-half-year adjustment period.

Irish mackerel and nephrops fishers have been hit the hardest by the cut in TAC as these boats do a lot or all of their fishing in UK waters.

Irish fishermen feel that once again, they have been sold-out and are now afraid a further round of fishing vessel decommissioning will be introduced, reducing the Irish fleet numbers and driving many more fishing communities to the brink of collapse.

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