Brian Leddin (Limerick City, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Kenny. I must advise members that we have a hard deadline of 1.45 p.m. Officials from two Departments are still to come in. We will wrap up this session soon. I will make my contribution before Deputy Whitmore comes in.

If anybody else wants to come in briefly in this session, they may indicate now and I will bring them in.

I will pick up on Deputy Whitmore's comment earlier about this Government and previous governments not having the measures in place, leading to the idea that we are now in a worse situation than we might have been had we the measures in place, though I would argue that there are measures in place. The nitrates action plan has been in place - we are on to the sixth one now - but the problem is not so much that the measures are not in place but, rather, that they are not being adhered to or implemented, and maybe the enforcement is not what it should be. Could you perhaps comment on that, Dr. Cotter? I seem to recall you saying in a previous session, maybe in this committee or maybe in the agriculture committee, that the plan is good - I am talking about nitrates now - but that we have had to revise it and introduce more stringent measures with each iteration of the plan because we have not fulfilled the plan of the day. We are on to sixth one now. Is it true to say that if we implement the sixth nitrates action plan, we will get back on the right road? That is my first question.

My second question is a broader one for both the EPA and Professor Scott and relates to the idea of developing an environment policy position that would look at all the different policy documents that are there, many of them in contradiction with one another. I think Professor Scott talked about 100-odd different documents. It seems so unwieldy. I refer to the idea of having this coherent environmental policy. It is quite amazing that we do not have it, actually, but in some way it is understandable because it is clearly very complicated. Are we moving towards that? Is that what is happening? I do not know if it is for you, Dr. Cotter, or Professor Scott to say, but I am interested in the direction of travel, that is, where we are trying to get to or where we should be trying to get to.