Ms Lorraine O'Donoghue:

The final issue raised by the Deputy on the aquaculture licensing.is solely under the remit of the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine. It has nothing to do with the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government, so I will not comment further on it.

The role of the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government will fundamentally change and will in future be a "landlord type role". The only reason we are retaining a function is that one body will have a coherent sense of what is happening on a national level. The foreshore and the exclusive economic zone, EEZ, are effectively State property. There is a premium attached to using it, and somebody has to oversee and regulate it and collect any rents that might be due. That will be the role of the Minister in the future. In terms of property rights, this will be covered by leases and licences. We will be framing the legislation in such a way and the issue has been flagged by the Office of the Attorney General so that permanent property rights do not accrue to somebody who has a five year foreshore licence. Obviously, with a very large-scale project with a long-term foreshore lease up to 35 or in some cases 99 years, it is a slightly different scenario. Although they may have a very long-term lease, they only hold the property as a leasehold and are not buying a freehold and the property ultimately remains in the ownership of the State.

Reference was made to the Lissadell judgment, which is quite timely in terms of the Bill and we are actively considering it at present before we move into the detailed drafting. Obviously, the Office of the Attorney General is looking at it also in terms of possible implications for access to the foreshore.

The exclusive economic zone was raised as well. I should have brought a copy of the real map of Ireland as it shows our designated continental shelf and our exclusive economic zone, which I think stretches to approximately 200 km off the west coast. Obviously, it would be a great deal narrower on the east coast but there is an agreed boundary between Ireland and the UK. That is set out under international law and is regulated at international level and negotiated under one of the UN conventions. The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade has a very active role in terms of that. In some parts of the country it stretches out to 200 km. We do not think it is appropriate that local authorities would have a role out to 200 km and we will not be buying any boats for them to go out and assess at that distance. An Bord Pleanála will be the single authority with the competence and people in place to consider applications out in that space.

Out at that distance from shore is a very challenging environment so there are limits as to what kind of activity can take place. In terms of nearer to the shore and within the traditional foreshore, we are leaving that as it is because the outer boundary of the foreshore coincides with the outer boundary of our territorial seas, where we have full territorial rights. Beyond the 12 nautical miles in the exclusive economic zone, while we have sovereign rights, they are more limited. We cannot impede navigation, for example, and fishery rights are regulated by the European Union. There are various other elements as well.

Coming back to the issue of the level of activity that will be devolved to the local authority, it is worth bearing in mind that at present we receive 50 to 60 applications a year, so if one averages that out among the coastal local authorities, it is really only three to four applications per year. When we are considering those issue, we will have to consider how efficient it is that every local authority would require a new foreshore unit to consider matters at sea, and from where they would draw the expertise in terms of marine ecology. At present, we draw them from the marine licence vetting committee. We are also looking at whether that should remain in place. There are mixed views on that matter.

The Aarhus Convention was raised in the context of an appeals process. I know some witnesses who appeared before the committee earlier today raised it. The foreshore consent system as it stands and as it will stand is fully compliant with the Aarhus Convention. I am intimately familiar with it, having worked on it for four years before I joined the section dealing with the marine area. It is not necessarily recognised in sectoral legislation; the access to information pillar is dealt with by a particular set of regulations. The public participation pillar has been integrated into the foreshore planning and other consent systems, while the access to justice elements have been implemented by section 50, 50A, 50B of the Planning and Development (Amendment) Act 2010. We have a robust system in place to implement the Aarhus Convention. We were late in doing it but I would argue very strongly that we are fully compliant with it.