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17 1939

FISHERIES ACT, 1939

Chapter VI.

Supplementary Provisions.

Right of access to vested fisheries.

87. —(1) Any authorised person shall at all times have a right of free access to any vested fishery and shall be entitled, subject to the provisions of this Act, with boats or vehicles to enter on any watercourse or land for the purpose of operating the fishery, and may remove (subject in the case of the foreshore to the consent of the Minister for Industry and Commerce) any obstruction, natural or otherwise, to his passage.

(2) If any person obstructs any authorised person in the exercise of the powers conferred on such authorised person by this section, such person shall be guilty of an offence under this section and shall be liable on summary conviction thereof to a fine not exceeding twenty pounds.

(3) In this section the expression “authorised person” means a person authorised by the Minister to exercise the powers conferred on an authorised person by this section.

(4) Where the normal access to a transferable fishery vested in the Minister was before such vesting through any enclosed premises, yard, garden or land surrounding or adjacent to a dwelling house, the right of free access conferred by sub-section (1) of this section shall not be exercisable by way of such premises, yard, garden or land, save where the same are separated from, and were before such vesting used solely in connection with, such fishery.

(5) An offence under this section may be prosecuted by the Minister.

Exercise of angling rights.

88. —(1) Where a transferable fishery in any water flowing through land surrounding or adjacent to a dwelling house has become vested in the Minister and the angling rights in such water have not been reserved under an angling rights (reservation) order, any person lawfully entitled to fish with rod and line on such water and his paid servants or attendants shall be entitled to pass along the banks of such water for the purpose of such fishing or of going to or returning from such fishing, but for no other purpose.

(2) This section shall not entitle any person to enter any enclosed yard or garden or any buildings.

Liability of Minister for damage by flooding.

89. —No claim shall lie against the Minister for flooding of lands or other consequential damage due to the continued existence of any structure (including a weir and a mill-dam which on the date of vesting formed part of or existed in a fishery vested in the Minister under Chapter II of this Part of this Act) unless the Minister shall have increased the height of such structure or shall have closed the openings or gaps therein to an extent to which they could not have been legally closed on the said date.

Provisions in relation to mill-dam fisheries.

90. —(1) The following provisions shall have effect in relation to any mill-dam fishery vested in the Minister under Chapter II of this Part of this Act, and to the fishing mill-dam, by means of part of which such fishery is carried on, that is to say:—

(a) so long as the Minister makes no alteration, other than repairs to casual defects in those parts of the structure of such dam essential to the carrying on of such fishery, he shall not be liable for any part of the cost of maintaining the mill-dam;

(b) any authorised person shall have a right of free access to such fishery and such right shall extend if necessary to the mill, power-house, or other premises adjacent to or connected with such mill-dam, but if the owner or occupier of such mill, power-house or premises shall offer to the Minister facilities for other reasonable means of access, the Minister shall accept such facilities in lieu of such first mentioned right of access, and shall carry out such works as may be necessary to render the same effective;

(c) the Minister may cause to be erected such walls, fences or other structures as he may think necessary for the protection of such fishery against trespass in such situation as he may require, but where any such walls, fences or other structures may interfere with the access of the owner or occupier to such mill-dam, the Minister shall provide such owner or occupier with the necessary means of getting through or over them;

(d) if the mill, power-house or premises which such mill-dam is intended to serve becomes vacant, or if the water impounded by such mill-dam, ceases to be used for power purposes, either partly or wholly, the Minister shall none the less continue to be entitled to use such fishery, and the provisions of section 31 (which relates to alteration of abandoned and disused dams) of this Act shall apply.

(2) If any person obstructs any authorised person in the exercise of the powers conferred on such authorised person by this section, such person shall be guilty of an offence under this section and shall be liable on summary conviction thereof to a fine not exceeding twenty pounds.

(3) In this section the expression “authorised person” means a person authorised by the Minister to exercise the powers conferred on an authorised person by this section.

(4) An offence under this section may be prosecuted by the Minister.

Restrictions on Minister's powers.

91. —Nothing in this Act shall operate to authorise the Minister—

(a) to construct or erect on tidal lands (within the meaning of the Foreshore Act, 1933 (No. 12 of 1933)), any work or structure, other than a fixed engine for the capture of salmon, trout or eels legally existing, or for which a certificate existed, in the year in which this Act is passed, without the consent of the Minister for Industry and Commerce or otherwise than in accordance with the terms and conditions of such consent;

(b) to erect any buildings or structures which may interfere with the amenities of the residence or pleasure grounds of a person who was the owner or occupier of a fishery vested in the Minister under Chapter II of this Part of this Act or operate such fishery in such a way as to interfere with such amenities.

Fishing licences in vested fisheries operated by the Minister.

92. —Where any vested fishery is being operated by the Minister under this Part of this Act all licences for fishing engines used in such fishery shall be taken out in the name of the Minister.

Voting by Minister at elections of conservators.

93. —(1) The Minister as a licence holder shall have power to vote at elections of conservators by a proxy appointed under his hand and the voting power of such proxy shall be calculated separately in respect of each fishing licence held by the Minister.

(2) Any instrument appointing a proxy under this section shall not require a stamp.

Nomination of ex-officio conservators by the Minister.

94. —(1) Where on the date on which the fishery rate for any fishery year is struck by a board of conservators any vested fishery situate in the fishery district of such board is valued at not less than fifty pounds, the Minister may nominate one person as his representative to be, until the next fishery rate is struck by such board, an ex-officio member in respect of such fishery of such board.

(2) Where—

(a) two or more vested fisheries in the same fishery district were vested in the Minister on the same date, and

(b) such fisheries were immediately before being so vested in the ownership or occupation of the same person,

then such fisheries shall for the purposes of sub-section (1) of this section be deemed to be one fishery the value of which is the aggregate value of all such fisheries.

(3) Where any vested fishery is for the time being leased or is for the time being an unused fishery, the value of such fishery shall for the purposes of sub-sections (1) and (2) of this section be deemed to be nil.

(4) Where the Minister is entitled under sub-section (1) of this section to nominate ex-officio members of two or more boards of conservators he may nominate the same person to be an ex-officio member of each of such boards.

(5) Where the Minister is entitled under sub-section (1) of this section to nominate two or more ex-officio members of a board of conservators, he may nominate, one person only, and in that case such one person shall have and may exercise at meetings of such board a number of votes equal to the number of ex-officio members of such board which the Minister is for the time being entitled to nominate.

(6) A person nominated by the Minister under this section to be an ex-officio member of a board of conservators shall have and may exercise as such member all the rights which are conferred by section 6 of the Fisheries (Ireland) Act, 1848, and this Act on a person who is an ex-officio member of a board of conservators.

Payments by Minister in lieu of fishery rate.

95. —(1) No fishery rate shall be payable by the Minister in respect of any vested fishery.

(2) Subject to the provisions of this section the Minister may, if he so thinks fit, in respect of each vested fishery, as on and from the payment day next following the date of vesting, pay in any fishery year to the board of conservators for the fishery district in which such fishery is situate in lieu of fishery rate a half-yearly sum calculated as a moiety of the fishery rate for the current fishery year on the poor law valuation existing at the date when the fishery rate is made.

(3) Where a vested fishery is for the time being an unused fishery no payment in lieu of fishery rate shall be made by the Minister in respect of such fishery after the commencement of the fishery year next after the date on which the Minister gives notice to the board of conservators within whose fishery district such fishery is situate of his intention to refrain from using such fishery.

(4) Where a vested fishery which has ceased to be worked by the Minister is subsequently worked by the Minister, payment in lieu of fishery rate may be made on and from the payment day next following the date on which such fishery is subsequently worked.

(5) Where a vested fishery is leased by the Minister under this Part of this Act, no payment in lieu of fishery rate shall be made by the Minister in respect of such fishery for any period during which any person is under an obligation to pay fishery rate in respect of such fishery.

(6) For the purposes of this section each of the following dates in each year shall be a payment day—

(a) the 1st day of April;

(b) the 1st day of September.