A Donegal TD says there is evidence that the Irish fishing industry is still being discriminated against in favour of the farming sector.
Deputy Padraig MacLochlainn says he has seen correspondence which shows an official in the department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine tried to stop Fisheries Minister Timmy Dooley from objecting to the scrapping of the Hague Preferences because it might have impacted on the Irish campaign at the time to maintain the derogation under the Nitrates Directive.
The Hague Preferences gave Ireland more quota, and Deputy MacLochlainn says the actions of Germany, France, Poland and the Netherlands in getting rid of them was a betrayal that jeapordised the future of the fishing sector here.
That a government official sought to facilitate that, he says, was inexcusable:
