Victor Boyhan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the witnesses. This is a great news story. I studied horticulture and I have had an allotment. I grow my own vegetables. I have a great interest in this area. As Ms Foreman said, Covid brought into sharp focus a desire for safe open spaces where people can meet in friendship, to engage in horticulture and grow items or to simply to be an observer. The reasons are diverse. She put her finger on it when she said all these community gardens have their own personalities and within that, there is a whole load of personalities as she will well know. I have been to places where there are disputes over plots and bits of land in allotments, I have seen communal gardens where people share the produce and there also are individuals who like to work on their own. I am not sure if the witnesses are familiar with Festina Lente, which was a substantial piece of ground in the Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown area, out in the Rathmichael direction, but it was never developed. A wonderful organisation, Festina Lente, hasten slowly, which provided sheltered employment opportunities for people with disabilities, had so much ground that it put allotments around it but now those people have been forced out because developers want the land. There is always that demand. That loss is regrettable. Having looked at the UK model, I am familiar with the one in Battersea where the people convinced the council to change the land zoning. It was very positive in terms of mental health and many other issues. People said this was positive news. The council switched that piece of land for another piece of land because it knew it could not recreate what the people had there. I am convinced this is a great idea. There are different models for different places just as there are different horses for different courses.

A big issue I have learned from my knowledge of and involvement in community gardens is that we also need to talk about community gardeners, about people who lead where leadership and skills are required. I visited a place in south County Dublin where there were approximately 40 allotments, half of which had gone seed and were abandoned. When I asked why that had happened, I was told that other than growing cabbage and potatoes, the people did not know how to grow anything else. They did not have the skill set. There is a need for local authorities to employ a community gardener to assist people. People bring different levels of skills to different places. I would like to hear more about that proposal. I have looked at the Scottish model, which Mr. McCormack referenced in his presentation. It seems to have worked very well in Scotland and Wales. I know they are great gardeners but I am now convinced we have become even greater gardeners, certainly in the past two years. There is massive new interest in gardening and growing and the fact that people are out in the air and have their hands in the soil. It is organic. There is something to be had by putting one's hands directly into the soil and growing items. That is a positive development.

We do not have agricultural committees in Dublin any more. We used to have county agricultural committees. That was a missed opportunity. I live in Dún Laoghaire, and as in the case of Fingal and south Dublin, there are agricultural lands right up to the county areas of the city but we do not have agricultural committees as such. What are the witnesses' view on community gardeners, leaders or advocates who would assist people who want to gain knowledge? One learns in gardening from making mistakes. There is need for such assistance. I am familiar with community land trusts in the UK. They work really well. What is the witnesses' experience, if any, of community land trusts and how can we develop them? I do not want to move responsibility for such provision from central government to local government but I believe the bulk of this can all be driven at local government level. It is about connectivity, subsidiarity and meeting the needs of the people in local communities. I am 100% supportive of community gardens. We needs loads more of them. The witnesses might share with the committee their experience of community land trusts and how they work.