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

I will be as brief as I can. I thank the Minister of State, Senator Hackett, and her officials for attending and I wish her well. From people contacting me I can see that there is a sustained programme of clawing funding back from people who have planted forestry. People who planted ten or 20 years ago are receiving letters from the Department demanding repayment of funds over alleged over-claims. Does the Minister of State think it is reasonable to do that, considering that many of the reclaims are arising due to a new mapping system that is available to the Forest Service that was not available 20 years ago? As she is aware, this is causing negative publicity and stress to the farming community. Is it true that if a farmer wants to plant 5 acres of land in County Kerry and he or she is within 15 km from a specific protection area or a special area of conservation, which is the case in nearly every inch of Kerry, unless he or she spends more than €1,500 on a Natura impact statement, the application will be sitting in the ecology section of the Forestry Service for two years before a decision is made?

Could the witnesses inform the committee as to the number of files in the ecology department of the forest service, and the number in archaeology department? Why can forest entrances not be treated like agricultural entrances? It is fair to say that the new single consent system is not working with regard to forest road approvals. Some councils are looking for extraordinary bonds to be put in place by forest owners prior to the commencement of work. I give the example of a council that looked for a cash bond of €240,000 before works could commence. The forest service and some councils look for sight lines which would be more in keeping with an industrial factory, rather than a forest entrance.

Take a typical application, for example. It goes from the ecology department to the archaeology department and then to the National Parks and Wildlife Service. Are these steps taking too long? Could these steps not run simultaneously? As has been outlined, there are some applications with the forest service for many years. In Kerry, as the witnesses know from their records, most roads being built can be dug out of clay. In other words, the material is in the ground nearby. We can dig off the bog, dig out the clay, make a road and put 804 stone on top of it. This road is perfectly suitable for purpose. I remind the Minister of State that this is how the roads were made for many years. There was no such thing as importing material. One actually went into an area. I am talking about local authority roads, not forestry roads. We dug out clay, we made roads and we put tar and chip on top of them, although for many years, there was only gravel on top of them.

I ask Mr. Hayes to address the following matter. Inspectors who are listening to me right now on their computers are going around inspecting roads. I ask these inspectors the following question. For God's sake, where is the common sense in the context of a forestry road of telling a person to dig out the bog and import 804 broken or crushed stone, where there is a depth of forestry that might be as high as this committee room, or maybe higher? First, consider the damage to the environment of going to a quarry 20 or 30 miles away to fill up lorries with stone and then to fill in a depth of this room and to cover it with 804 stone. There is no common sense in that. I am not directing this question to the Minister of State or Mr. Hayes but to the inspectors who are at home listening to me. Where is the common sense in this process? The available grant will not sustain this. Forestry roads will not be built if inspectors continue to ask people to do this.

I want to say to the Minister of State, Mr. Hayes and to other individuals who I will not name because, as the Chairman knows, I am too polite that there are people who over the past ten years have taken over roles in the forest service and that we were planting between 10,000 ha and 12,000 ha of forestry each year. This is down to 2,000 ha to 3,000 ha under their watch. I am asking those people and Mr. Hayes the following question. How can anyone in the forest service say that he or she has done a good job if he or she has seen us go from a high figure to a low one. They have run it into the ground. The Minister of State knows I am not blaming her.

Our adorable foresters, many of whom are old and for whom I worked for years, are at home watching this committee. They are ashamed at where we are today. The Minister of State said a while ago that officials are not happy with the situation. I disagree with her. I would say there are officials in her Department who are extremely happy because they have driven us to where we are today. They put us here through gobbledegook and nonsense. Mr. Hayes said, "We hold our hands up" and "We are where we are." They would want to be holding their hands and their legs up. Many people would want to hang their heads in shame as a result of what they have done. There are people, who know who they are, who have brought us to where we are today and it cannot be allowed to continue. We will not allow it to continue.