Ms Oonagh Duggan:

In response to Deputy Catherine Martin's question about how this legislation complies with the birds directive and whether the Attorney General had been informed, we understand from the National Parks and Wildlife Service, NPWS, that there was some communication between the Department and the Attorney General. We have seen no documentation to that end to indicate that the Attorney General is satisfied. We know from information under the access to information on the environment legislation that we received from NPWS that there were significant concerns among its staff about compliance with the birds directive. I am not sure if that has been resolved.

The curlew is not the only species that is going to be impacted. BirdWatch Ireland's submission, sent in at the start of 2015, lists other species, such as meadow pipet, wheatear, stonechat, skylark, snipe, golden plover and hen harrier. We are not just talking about one species where we have some idea of locations. There are other species that are more widespread and not mapped that will also be impacted by burning in the uplands in that time.