Steven Matthews (Wicklow, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I have to move on, but I will bring Mr. Fogarty back in on my questioning. I thank Senator Boyhan and welcome the Minister, Deputy Noonan, to the committee. I think it indicates his commitment and interest that he is in the Public Gallery to listen to our experts. I read quite a lot on marine protected areas before this legislation was produced. When this general scheme was published on 16 December 2022, I was delighted to read it. I also want to acknowledge the committee members. We found the opportunity to deal with this as soon as we possibly could after the production of the general scheme. We are obviously going into the consolidated planning Bill, which is going to take up quite a lot of our time. The process at the moment is that we produce a report with recommendations. Many of those here will be familiar with that. It is at the production of the Bill stage that we have the opportunity to tighten up or clarify that language. It will be a piece of legislation whereas this is a general scheme.

The issue of the consultation period of four weeks outlined in 9(2) and six weeks outlined in 7(4) being too short is acknowledged by everybody including the members. We should seek a longer timeframe for people to engage and submit content. I am aware people have quite a lot of interest in and expertise and knowledge of the marine area. We do not want to push out the time period for so long that we delay things, but we can find a fair balance in that. Mr. Fogarty had a question about the word "appropriate." Would a definition of appropriate be something that can be proven not to negatively impact on the objectives of what one is trying to protect? Would that be close to what is meant by appropriate? I will ask Mr. Fogarty to hold on to that for one minute and come back to me.

Wind Energy Ireland has members who have built offshore wind farms across Europe, and they have experienced this. Has any of its members fed in anything from their experiences of developing offshore wind farms either in, or in proximity to, a marine protected area? We are late to the game in offshore, but it has been done in other places so I would be interested in feedback on that. I read a piece in IEN's submission on the general scheme and was happy to see it coming forward. I thought it was positive. I fully support what we are trying to do here, and I think they know that. IEN states that "evaluated as a basic piece of legislation, in terms of what it can deliver as an outcome, it falls very short leaving scope for delay, weak implementation, poor and inadequate protection and falls far short of the expectations of our members focused in this area." and it explains why. Do BirdWatch Ireland, Irish Wildlife Trust, Fair Seas and the Irish Whale and Dolphin Trust share that opinion? Do they see it as overly critical? To my reading I thought it was quite a positive piece of legislation, notwithstanding that there are areas where we need to tighten up the language. The first question is to Mr. Fogarty.