Michael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I do not have the Chairman's pretty face in front me, whatever problem is occurring. I welcome the witnesses. I had a Zoom meeting with Bord na Móna one week ago. There are concerns around the country about drains that have been deepened and pumps are operating, boundary or mairning drains between farmers and drains that go through land to a river. There are places near Ballinasloe where this is happening. The meeting was constructive but constructive is one thing and having something down the road is another.

Bord na Móna said it would consult and liaise with farmers and do all the usual that everyone says they will do. I have no reason to doubt it but I proposed the farming organisations meet Bord na Móna. It needs to be done, even if we get an independent chairperson. It needs to be put down on paper because, as we are all aware, there have been too many times when verbal agreements were gone back on ten years later.

Once the rewetting is done, it will not be coming right up to a mairning. I have talked to an ecologist about it. There is rewetting done in areas near me and I understand how it operates. However, we need a written agreement between the parties to make sure there is no ambiguity or doubt in ten or 15 years' time. Once a bog is rewetted, people will not go back to look around except perhaps for some pairing. A commitment is needed to maintain the mairning or boundary drains between farmers and to keep pumps in place, where required. Those are the two biggest dangers.

There is a large amount of marginal land in counties Roscommon, Longford and Galway and the midlands counties that farmers are trying to make a living off. They would not be able to farm it if the drains were not cleaned. Milled peat has blocked some of the main rivers such the Little Brosna, which I travelled in the time of the Shannon. These issues need to be rectified in black and white. While everyone can smile at each other at a Zoom meeting, at the end of the day, farmers will suffer the consequences in five, ten or 15 years' time when we are no longer in politics.