Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal East, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Senator Noonan could write a book on that because the two of us were heavily involved in it and it was a great disappointment to us that we were not able to publish that legislation before the most recent election. There are opportunities potentially in the DMAP. The previous Government, and I have to credit Senator Noonan with a lot of the work that was done on this, was able to increase the marine protected areas from approximately 3% to 10%. This Government is committed to continuing that to 30%. The legislation is not the sole preserve of the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage or my Department. That section on the marine environment will move over to my Department. I believe we could do some of our marine protected areas, MPAs, through the national DMAP.