Dr. Andy Bleasdale:

The question was well posed. It is challenging. The results to date, based on our monitoring under the birds and habitats directive, have shown declining trends. I am a scientist and manage a team of scientists and I believe it is fair to say that if my team were charged only with the ongoing reporting of negative trends, we would not be in this job for much longer, because that cannot be an end in itself. It is a call for action. The question for us all concerns what we should do about the negative trends and how to halt the decline and seek to address it.

Ms Carberry has talked about what we need to do. Regarding the hearts and minds issue and the dialogue we have been having on the national biodiversity action plan and its delivery over the past two years, there have been citizens' assemblies on biodiversity loss, both the young people's one and the general one, and there have been joint Oireachtas committee recommendations. A suite of voices across wider society and Departments are seeking action. It cannot depend only on the National Parks and Wildlife Service; it has to involve an all-of-government response. We have been engaging pretty proactively at meetings of the senior officials group and through Cabinet subcommittees, and we have a mandate from the Government to deliver. Therefore, the question for us all now is how we can actually build on the goodwill, energy, enthusiasm and demonstration of good practice in pilot projects to address the challenges, pressures and threats so that the next time we report, the threats and pressures will have diminished and the results will be more positive, giving us the energy and momentum to seek to continue to deliver.

We have all seen supports through the biodiversity working group and the biodiversity forum and stakeholder groups that are being engaged with to build capacity, engagement and the all-of-society response to the biodiversity crisis. It is positive even though the results are currently negative. We are turning the ship around, I believe.