James Bannon (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)

I know that well. The Minister is interrupting me. Why did he not interrupt the two previous speakers?

What the Minister fails to acknowledge is that hunting creates a sense of community in rural areas. My farm has facilitated hunting throughout my life and both my father and grandfather before him allowed the hunts to pass through our lands. I will continue to allow them do so. Hunting unites farmers and sports people for a common recreational purpose and tradition.

I am deeply concerned at the appalling actions of the Minister and his wilting Green Party, which are aimed at destroying country wide field sports. The fact this Bill could be the opening salvo in a stealth attack on all field sports is of deep concern to me and my constituents in the midlands. Were there to be restrictions on other areas of country life, recreation and rural tourism, the rural population would suffer extreme hardship and unemployment and rural depopulation would escalate.

I should, of course, be relaxed and at ease about the threat to field sports, as I got the Minster's assurance that they are not at risk in reply to an Adjournment matter I tabled last April. The Minster stated then:

Last year, the Government approved the drafting of legislation to prohibit the hunting of deer by a pack of hounds. I want to make it clear that this legislation will not have any implications for other country pursuits such as fox hunting, hare coursing or deer stalking. Hunting with harriers and beagles will still be permitted and, therefore, foxhound, harrier and beagle hunting associations in the State can continue to operate as before as this legislation will not impact on them.

However, my trust in this is upset by a picture in my mind of the Minister with his fingers crossed behind his back, saying "Not yet anyway", under his breath.

I cannot help but think of the way the Minister and the Government sold out the turf-cutters in the midlands and throughout the country. How did his heritage brief come into the reckoning when he was destroying centuries of tradition? The Minister must refuse to put EU directives ahead of the welfare of rural turf cutters. Turf cutting is a skill that has passed from fathers to sons and daughters and is a community activity that fosters pride in a locality. Those involved are keenly aware of environmental issues and co-operate with local authorities in ensuring that bogs are kept waste free by removing domestic waste and other illegal dumping. Turf cutting is part of our culture and tradition. As such it faces the encroaching globalisation that is stripping us of our unique heritage. No compensation could make good the loss of the tradition of generations.

This is not to say that environmental considerations can be overlooked. The survival of our unique flora and fauna must be balanced against turbary rights. However, the Minister presided over the greatest assault on the rights of domestic turf cutters to the detriment of rural people, leaving a bitterness he has ignored but that will return to haunt him at the next election. This is a serious concern considering the 16,000 people on the live register in Longford-Westmeath and the 439,100 unemployed throughout the country. As the Minister pursues his blinkered course, more and more jobs will slip through the Government's fingers. While the initial target of the ban is stag hunting, groups such as anglers see the ban as a prelude to a wider and more aggressive so-called green agenda in the future. An eel farmer was recently put out of business in Westmeath. This ban could be the end of countryside recreation as we know it and another blow to our already hard hit tourism industry.

Perhaps this Bill is part of the syndrome that sees the Government wasting money the country does not have on frog and bat surveys. While the bats may be deserting the belfries, the Government is taking their place. Important legislation that will have a positive impact on this country is being deferred every day in the House, but the Minister thinks it is important to waste time and resources to highlight this narrow green driven agenda, at the expense of solving economic and social problems. Neither I nor Fine Gael share his misguided ideas. Rural Ireland is under threat and our traditional way of life faces destruction. Through the Wildlife (Amendment) Bill 2010, the Green Party, which is an urban based party, essentially puts a ban on our rural way of life, rural tradition, tourism and the rural economy.

Following this legislation, the anti puppy farming Bill will see the Minister break another promise. That Bill will turn into an anti- kennel and anti-greyhound Bill. Before the Minister rushes headlong into creating more devastation in this sector, he should consider the fact that greyhound coursing and racing support 11,000 jobs and add €500 million each year to our economy. Deputy Wallace was right on that. The Bill will have a devastating effect on jobs if it is allowed go ahead. While €500 million may appear small change to a Government which thinks nothing of throwing €22 billion of taxpayers' money into the gutter, the revenue generated is extremely important to hard pressed rural communities.

The Minister's extraordinarily blinkered approach to the banning of deer hunting by stags has led him to remove the provision from the Animal Health and Welfare Bill and introduce it as stand-alone legislation, the Wildlife (Amendment) Bill 2010. This strikes me as unnecessary point scoring and an outright attack on those who have protested against the legislation in any form. It reinforces the Government system of democracy by numbers. As I said previously in the House, I was shocked to see on the Minister's website the no-holes-barred assertion that the Green Party intended to attack coursing and fox hunting and secure a legislative ban on all blood sports. As in most things, we know there is no consensus with the Green Party's partner in Government, Fianna Fáil. In April, the Fianna Fáil Minister, Deputy Batt O'Keeffe, said there was no Government proposal or Bill to ban stag hunting. How wrong he was.

Research indicates that hunting had an economic value of €111.6 million in 2007, but the Minister must not have noted this. This value is broken down as follows: game shooting, €41.7 million; hunting with hounds, €34.2 million; coursing, €26.2 million; deer shooting, €8.9 million; and falconry, €0.6 million.

I cannot emphasise strongly enough the devastation to the sporting, economic, leisure and tourism activities of any ban on field sports, hare coursing or stag hunting. Any such move would be detrimental to the country as a whole and to the countryside in particular.

The voices of the 300,000 field sports members have been loud in opposition to this Bill. Banning hunting, which is a strong tradition in rural Ireland going back centuries and over many generations, would be a threat to the rural way of life and would be strongly resisted by rural people and by people living in towns who participate in rural sports, many of whom I am delighted to welcome onto my farm every spring. Deer and fox hunting have had a long history in this country since the 19th century and earlier. The Ward Union Hunt, which is the only licensed stag hunt in the country, covers areas of north County Dublin, together with the south and east of County Meath. I note this is Deputy Wallace's constituency and I wonder whether she would have been so voluble on this issue had it not affected part of her constituency. I hope so, in the interests of country pursuits. The hunt maintains its own herd of 150 red deer. The stags are not generally killed but are recaptured and returned to the herd. Each stag is checked before and after the hunt and its stress levels recorded. Moreover, each stag is hunted only once a year and is checked by the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government's wildlife officers and veterinarians. The Ward Union Hunt has 200 members and contributes €1.4 million to €1.5 million to the economy each year.

As there are 27,000 members of the National Association of Regional Game Councils who are organised in 926 clubs, the Minister can assess the impact of any attempt to curtail or prohibit field sports of this nature. My constituency of Longford-Westmeath contains 2,000 members of the National Association of Regional Game Councils, 800 of whom are affiliated to the Longford Shooting and Conservation Council and 1,200 of whom are affiliated to the Westmeath Regional Game Council. I ask the Minister to consider the implications of this ill-considered threat to the Ward Union's carted stag hunt and field sports. I do not know what he hopes to gain from the interference in a well-regulated sporting sector. However, I am aware of the great losses that would be incurred by sporting organisations, tourism groups and the economy.

Ironically, the greatest loss could be to the Minister himself and to his Government, which has presided over the rape of the countryside. The Minister, Deputy John Gormley, who I am pleased to note has returned to the Chamber, is pushing a narrow Green Party agenda and is merely attempting to cover up the failed record of his party in Government. This has included protecting bankers over citizens by virtue of a banking bailout of €73 billion that even Professor Patrick Honohan has argued was too broad. As I noted previously, last week it emerged that €22 billion has been wasted in the toxic Anglo Irish Bank. I also refer to the Government's failure to take early and decisive action in the budget in 2008 and the Minister's complete lack of a job strategy at a time of record unemployment when almost 450,000 people are out of work.

Moreover, the Minister is delaying investigations into the Dublin Docklands Development Authority to protect his partners in Government, namely, the Taoiseach, Deputy Brian Cowen, and associates. The Government's failures also include slashing allowances for the blind, those with disabilities and children, as well as taking medical cards from the elderly. In addition, last year the Minister voted in the Dáil in support of Deputies Willie O'Dea and Bertie Ahern and the Minister, Deputy Mary Harney. He has helped to vote down all attempts to hold the three outstanding by-elections. He has overseen a water system that is not fit for purpose and which acts as a drag on the economy. He literally was asleep during the night of the bank guarantee scheme. I hope the Minister is not sleeping here today, as I notice he is nodding a little. He has engaged in a campaign against rural Ireland to appease his own narrow base of supporters. These are all factors that will militate against the Minister.

The Government has destroyed the farming sector and has left rural areas without viable infrastructure, transport, health and educational facilities. Lack of funding and lack of support has left farmers at the mercy of directives, which have consumed their meagre resources, etc.

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