Michael McNamara (Clare, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the officials for their presentation but the concern of farmers along the Clare coast goes further than what was addressed. Most of these areas are SACs, special area of conservation, and SPAs, special protection area, and farmers are unclear as to what they can do with repairing embankments on them. They simply cannot get an answer to this. It is indicative of a fragmented approach by various Departments. This has not been going on for the past several weeks but goes back 30 years with various Departments pussyfooting around this, disowning responsibility for culverts, in particular, and embankments. Farmers are quite prepared to repair these themselves, if they think they could without being penalised. They all have detailed maps setting out what is and is not in a SPA and SAC, yet, they still cannot get a clear answer as to what they can do on them.

Which Department is responsible for this? I have correspondence going back to former Ministers, Brendan Daly, Noel Treacy and John Wilson, on this matter. I do not mention them because they are all Fianna Fáil. They just happened to be in power at the time. If it had been Fine Gael or Labour Ministers, I am sure it would not have been any different. At some point, the buck-passing has to stop and someone must take responsibility. Democratic parliamentary accountability is about someone being responsible for key State infrastructure. Will the officials address this point? What steps are being taken between the Department and the National Parks and Wildlife Service which regularly inspects farms along the Shannon and Fergus estuaries?