89 



VI. PENALTIES. All just and reasonable measures that would 

 secure a more efficient protection to Irish Inland Fisheries, 

 might be considered as effecting a saving of resources, and as 

 a check upon crime. The consequences of familiarizing men 

 with the violation of the law are well known to be dangerous. 



The Select Committee report, that " they perceive with 

 regret, that of late years there has been growing up in Ireland, 

 a neglect on the part of all classes to protect the Fisheries in 

 that country, or to check the poaching or illegal destruction of 

 fish ; and that those evil practices have consequently very much 

 increased of late years, and are now in very prevalent and mis- 

 chievous operation." 



The object of penalties being to deter offences for the time 

 to come, they should be sufficient in all cases to render it a loss 

 to incur them. The Committee report, that those now pro- 

 vided are not sufficient to repress the mischiefs against which 

 they were directed, that the extreme penalty is rarely im- 

 posed, and even if it were, the offender would often be the 

 gainer, when the profits of the offence are large enough to out- 

 free gap, or queen's share for the passage of fish, was required by some of the 

 repealed statutes to be opened in some of these weirs ; but there is reason to 

 believe that this provision has been far from receiving very general enforce- 

 ment. Some of those statutes expressly excepted certain weirs from even that 

 restrictioli ; so that the owners appeared to be empowered by Parliament to 

 maintain, even in navigable rivers, a solid weir from shore to shore, opposing 

 an effectual obstruction to the passage alike of fish and of boats. 



Very much of the decline of the fisheries, and the decrease of the fish, 

 appears to have been caused by this improvident system of capture.* 



* On the question how far such erections are legal, notwithstanding the 

 statutes in question, your Committee do not conceive themselves at liberty to 

 offer any opinion. But they consider that the sooner that question is determined 

 the better, whether for the parties themselves or for the public. 



' In this point of view also, it would appear that whatever may be the legal 

 rights of the owners of such weirs, public policy demands that they shall not be 

 permitted to injure the Inland Fisheries and Navigation of Ireland any longer; 

 and that the question of the title to maintain the obstruction is material only in 

 this respect, that it involves the question of title to compensation for reducing it. 



'Your Committee beg to repeat, that in their opinion, the Fishery Acts 

 now in force with respect to fishing weirs used in the upper or fresh water 

 portions of rivers, are vague, inconsistent, and unsatisfactory, the unqualified 

 repeal of all former statutes having left it at least doubtful, whether the owners 

 of any such can derive any benefit from a provision subsequently made for 

 compensation to be granted for the making of queen's shares, or gaps, in cases 

 where such gaps or shares could not have been made before the passing of the 

 5 & 6 Vic., c. 106, the earliest of those enactments. 



' In case any fishing or other weirs now standing across any navigable river, 

 whether in its tidal or fresh-water portion, and not having any sufficient gap or 

 share for the passage offish, or the purposes of navigation, should hereafter be 

 adjudged to be legal, it is the opinion of your Committee, that the owner of 

 such weir should be compelled to receive out of the public funds, a just and 

 fair compensation for his right in that particular ; which being done, the Com- 

 missioners charged with the administration of Irish Fisheries, should forthwith 

 proceed to make all necessary or requisite alterations in such weir, so as to 

 secure the free passage of fish, and the navigation of such river.' Report, 1849. 



The quantity of fish was so increased in the Boyne by making a queen's gap in a weir, 

 that the weir actually took more than it had done previously. Evidence, p. 467. 



