Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Those 2,700 applications are being processed and being dealt with, and 2,300 licences were issued this year over the course of 2020. As licence applications are coming in, licences are going out but there has been a backlog there. Where there are 4,700 on hand currently, 2,300 have been issued over the year 2020. That needs to be more. It is ramping up and volume is coming out but it needs to continue to come out to address the supply crunches in the sector. Everything possible that can be done is being done to address that. They all must be processed in line with the law. It has to be robust processing and in line with policy and all the various requirements. This is why the additional staff needed to be put in place and are in place. It is also why we introduced the legislation and sought the co-operation of the House to fast-track it because of the urgency of the situation. We have issued 2,300 licences in 2020. Some 2,000 applications are with ecologists. The other 2,700 are regarded as not needing that ecological input and get processed as there is less involved in processing them. They are being processed also. Overall, whether the applications have an ecological input or are in the other category, it is essential that we have the staffing and the team in place to be able to deal with them and drive down the backlog. The immediate priority is to get volume into the sector to ensure we address the supply crunch and the timber that is there at the moment.