Paul Daly (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

To return to the section of the submission I referred to earlier, applications are now being cherry-picked due to volume. I have a serious concern about this and I can only imagine that if I was a farmer, a private individual who had a small application in at present, how he or she would be feeling on hearing this revelation today. Based on the problems I foresee in using this system into the future, and it has now been made public today, I plead with the officials to approach the Minister to introduce an amnesty for applications that are in the system. The Department can put a fixed period on it. I refer to applications that do not require an ecological input and applications that are of a small volume. We should implement an amnesty, clear the desk and start on a level playing field. Then there will be no favouritism or cherry-picking into the future and we will be able to keep up to speed with the applications. I plead with the officials to bring that forward to the Minister today, because we have opened a can of worms here by identifying the fact that licence applications are being cherry-picked based on volume.