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FRENCH FISHERMEN HAVE said they had reached an agreement with their British counterparts today over access to scallop-rich waters in the English Channel, after the long-simmering “Scallop Wars” flared into a high-seas confrontation last month.
“We managed to get an agreement. Tonight at midnight, they (the British fishermen) will leave the area in the Channel’s east and will only return on 1 November,” French industry representative Pascal Coquet told AFP.
French fishermen have been incensed that British scallop boats are accessing the fertile waters off the Baie de Seine area of Normandy in northwest France, while French boats are only allowed to fish there between October to May in order to protect stocks.
The French side had hoped to end a loophole that exempts British boats less than 15 metres, giving them first dibs at one of the main scallop sources off the French coast before the official season.
However the French fishermen failed to get the smaller British boats banned.
“We were forced to drop the 15-metres” requirement,” Coquet said.
The French side agreed to give the British fishermen an additional fishing quota, he added.
Jim Portus, the chief executive of Britain’s South Western Fish Producers Organisation, said it was “a compromise”.
“It’s not the best deal… but it’s better than no deal,” Portus said.
Dozens of French boats confronted a handful of British rivals in the waters late last month to keep them from the area, with a few vessels ramming others as angry French fishermen threw stones and smoke-bombs.
The agreement, which comes after weeks of negotiations between both sides, must now be endorsed by both governments.
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And the government is talking of heaping more taxes etc on people later in the year. They should cop on & realise you cant tax your way out of a recession. Consumers will spend less and less as the cuts go deeper.
Don’t worry people, your money and future are going to bailout out private businesses, that were mismanaged, often criminally so, and who in any normal country would have had their bondholders burnt. The irony of the a left wing party, the Shinners pointing out what is a correct thing for capitalism to do, and be backed in that by the world’s leading economists against the so called economic realists of FG and FF, whose actions are considered crazed by most of the world’s leading investors and economists. The thing is that those economists are looking at FG and FF from their own experiences, they are not aware that FG and FF will and have repeatedly driven this economy in to the mud to protect and enrich a very small no. of people that are their friends and donors. Half the population have had to lave since the foundation of the state, brought to edge of bankruptcy 4 times in 50 years, both parties are unique in the western world, having both quadrupled state debt.
Heard on the radio that we consumers are unwilling to part with our cash – cash? What cash???
and
“Michael Noonan recently urged the Irish public to get and spend” – spend what?!
It just shows how out of touch these politicians are,I barely have enough money to be able to cover my mortgage and buy groceries for the month .. ,,it really is getting to the stage where I would be better off claiming welfare..taxing the hell out of us isnt the way forward.
This grand for him is say get out and spend and on the other side Richard Bruton is planning on cutting pay to the low paid workers.
Again this government and previous one alike fail to understand that it is the low & middle income earners that spend their money in the local economy but for some reason they continue to impose higher taxes etc. onto them.
Speaking of consumer sentiment, I didn’t see The Journal cover the EU story yesterday from a Euro stat report showing that Irish people paid more for pretty much everything from alcohol, tobacco and groceries to hotels than most other EU countries. Might have something to do with consumer sentiment?
What’s new?
There is no direction out there . Until we see stability in EU we will be afraid to spend.
I spent €60 in B&Q yesterday so your welcome Mr Noonan…
I have a plan. The government should appoint one ridiculously upbeat, one nagging, and one burly Confidence Fairy! on every street.
The upbeat one will come to your door first. She will tell you how great you are, and how everything is going to turn out just fine, remind you we have close friends like Barack Obama and Queen Elizabeth rooting for us, and try to convince you to start living the high life again.
The nagging one will be next. She will tell you that you have seriously failed as a father by not going to the pub, not changing the car, not having a family holiday (in Mayo), and because you insist on your wife buying own-brand stuff in Tesco.
If these don’t get you spending again then the burly Confidence Fairy! will come to your door smelling of strong liquor. He will grab you by the scruff of the neck and drag you to the nearest ATM. He will kick you in the posterior repeatedly until you have withdrawn €1,000. He will then drag you to the pub and shout THE DRINKS ARE ON…you.
He will then drag you to every Celtic Fiasco business in your local area and kick you until you have spent all your hard earned money on vouchers for coffee shops, spas, hairdressers, dental hygienists, aromatherapy and reflexology, and on deposits for soffits, wall insulation and cobble-lock paving.
Sounds far-fetched?
Remember that pension thingy you were saving for old age?
The gov must think the people of ireland are like ATMs just put in there hands and take out what ever they want
You kind of need money to spend it in the first place, maybe that’s why people are not spending??? Just a thought!
YO NOONAYS ,SPEND SPEND SPEND EHY!!!!!!you must honestly think were gobshits DOES ANYBODY KNOW THE GREEK FOR OUR DAY IS COMMING
have your say