Ms Sarah Clancy:

It is about dialogue, dialogue and more dialogue. I know we do not have time for it. Some of the best biodiversity and climate activists in Clare are farmers. From the narrative, you would imagine that the two never met but that is a shorthand view that does not represent circumstances on the ground. I am not saying that agriculture as currently practised is not hugely environmentally damaging. It is also damaging the commons, which is a justice issue. People in Clare other than dairy farmers have a right to clean water. There are competing rights at play. The only way they can be teased out is through dialogue. This is really simple. I am not saying we are the best. We do loads of things wrong in Clare but our environment college invited Macra na Feirme to a meeting and chat with it. It had a great meeting. The farmers, particularly young farmers, told it about the various biodiversity projects. It leads me to think that to a certain extent, the representatives of farmers are possibly the representatives of agribusiness rather than farmers. We saw the beef plan movement emerge in Clare. It has since dissipated but there are significant differences within farming and there needs to be a way to talk to people with their representative bodies but also in more relaxed settings away from the representative bodies to see what our common interests are. Farmers have a common interest in our environment, community, public transport and clean water, as do I. We have more common interests than differing interests. We need to create a place where those common interests can be discussed. That might be something worth talking about. I know the Government is doing climate dialogues. Change is hard. That is the main thing for most people. In particular, if you think you are going to lose something you think is part of your identity by changing, that-----