Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The local authority has no remit on this road. It cannot go into it at all. I am asking the National Parks and Wildlife Service to see to this because people are driving on it and walking, but it is a hazard and needs to be addressed.

Another matter about which I am very concerned is the burning that took place in the national park this year. Some years ago, when I was on Kerry County Council, I asked that the national parks would ensure that they would have fire belts all around their property where possible and to divide properties in their ownership so that if a fire started in one place, it would be prevented from spreading elsewhere. This is only common sense. I do not think this has been addressed properly. We understood that like the North of Ireland, people would be allowed to burn all through the month of March but this year, the Minister, in her wisdom, said she would not allow burning in March. I am sure she must not have gone to Kerry because what people in Dublin do not realise is that in Kerry, we had a great deal of rain in February. As March progressed, it got dryer and that is when the fires started. People in Dublin need to realise that it rains in Kerry on far more days than it rains in Dublin and we need to have the month of March to have controlled burning. Thousands of acres were burned in the last episode. Much of it started inside the national park, and no one knows how. Those issues must be addressed. I appeal to the Minister that in future years she consider that we get more rain in Kerry, in Killarney and Mangerton, where these fires start ------