Mr. Barry Delany:

I thank Deputy Healy-Rae. We are always available to talk. I will meet anybody anywhere in any county. Wherever it might be we are always open to discuss these matters.

As we explained again to Deputy Shanahan, and I know Deputy Healy-Rae talked about work for the sector, there will be significant volumes of felling in the coming years. All of the planting in 1990 and later will reach maturity between 2030 and 2035. We are issuing licences for 9 million cubic metres a year to facilitate that for private landowners and Coillte, in an equal amount.

We have launched a new €1.3 billion programme. We have brought in additional premia and payments to encourage farmers to join the programme. There is a lot of competition for land due to other issues but we want farmers to see the programme as being complementary to their overall farm approach. Planting trees on farms is a sustainable thing to do, especially when one considers the current return in income for cattle farmers where 133% of their income comes from single farm payments and basic income support for sustainability, BISS, payments, and sheep to a lesser extent. Our new programme of planting forestry, whichever type is preferred, will complement farming.

Interestingly, 85% of the applications for afforestation that we have received so far have come from farmers and the remainder are from non-farmers with the average size of land being 8 ha. That percentage is significant and shows there is interest. We definitely have a lot more work to do and that is why I explained that we issued just over €1 million worth of approvals recently to registered foresters and other interested parties to promote forestry locally and regionally, which we very much support that. We also work closely with Teagasc on workshops around the country so farmers can speak to knowledgeable people about the possibilities that are on their land.

On the new programme, as part of the farmers' charter and as licensing issues point out, our turnaround times are dramatically decreasing. The waiting time is much less, especially for felling licences. For afforestation, things are a bit more difficult given the environmental constraints under which we must we work in terms of approval by the European Commission. We are committing to six and nine months - six months for files that are screened out and nine months for files that are screened in. Therefore, there is time for a reply and applicants have a timeline for when a licence will be issued. That is very much our target for the coming year for all of the applications on hand.

As I have committed to here, we will have a forest health stakeholder grouping to discuss exactly what has emerged from our engagement with the Scottish authorities. We will discuss what has emerged with all of the relevant stakeholders and we will discuss their concerns.

On ash dieback, as members will know, the situation has been very challenging. We have launched our new programme and issued just shy of 1,000 ha of approvals, which shows there is uptake. The Minister has advised that while we go through this process of trying to launch our action plan people would apply, clear their forests and plant. Applicants will not be prejudiced in any way in terms of anything that comes out of our ongoing engagement. As members will know, it is caught up in both state aid rules in terms of compensating people when they have already been paid to do certain things, and the fact that we pay €2,000 to clear the site plus people get the reconstitution payments to replant and establish that crop again.

On income forgone, it is very difficult to do that under EU state aid rules but that is something which is in the recommendations. We are committed to exploring every option, which is what we are doing and has probably led to a little delay in terms of those financial aspects and the regulatory rules. We are committed to delivering it as soon as possible because we understand the concerns. People just want to draw a line under this and get on with things, and we are committed to doing that as speedily as possible.