General elections come and go, but for the people of Clarinbridge, Co Galway, they hold particular significance. Destiny has it that the future of governments and their oyster bed should be inextricably linked.
Before one election, they lost it; before another, the State bought it back. And now, with a plebiscite in the offing, the Minister for the Marine has handed over the oyster bed to the community again.
The symmetry of this was recalled by Prof Noel Wilkins of NUI Galway when he spoke at the official transfer in Kilcolgan Castle just over a week ago.
No better man to mark it, as Prof Wilkins is author of the definitive history of oysters and oystering in Galway Bay, Squires, Spalpeens and Spats. It is a complicated history, dating back to 1872 when the St George family, local landowners, were granted ownership of the fishery.
Local people were outraged, and so began a 130-year struggle to regain traditional rights, which involved court cases, imprisonments and hunger strikes,
The State bought the fishery in 1981 and vested it in Bord Iascaigh Mhara (BIM). The sea fisheries board has worked closely with the local community ever since on research and development, to fulfil the bed's potential.
On March 22nd BIM marked the end of its period of stewardship by handing the fishery back to the chairman of Clarinbridge Oyster Co-Op, Mr Brian Martyn, and his committee.
The Minister for the Marine, Mr Fahey, paid tribute to the determination of the community of Clarinbridge, and said that "a century of injustice" had been put right in "giving back to the local people what was rightfully theirs in the first place".
He also announced proposals to build a purification unit at Tarrea, Kilcolgan, which should improve the quality of the oysters, and said that he had asked his Department to meet BIM and the Western Development Commission to identify the options available for "maximum possible public investment" in the project.
More than 150 people attended the handover in the historic setting of Kilcolgan Castle.