Michael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-Galway, Independent)
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I am not inventing something new. When we work on a report we need to go to nearly every door and to study hydrology and ecology on a bog is a lot of work. There is no point in saying it is not. Someone has to make a call. I am not saying it is Mr. Boland. He can write a report but a Minister must make a call through a legislative process to make provision whereby you can show that within a buffer zone, you are not damaging the whole integrity of a site. That is copying the habitats directive on not having an adverse effect on a site . The area is always degraded where peat was milled before, to put it simply. Generally these areas are bigger than 30 ha at the moment, so the buffer zone will already be there no matter what is done. A Minister must make a decision that with the buffer zone and the 30 ha, if an owner can show that a bog will not be damaged hydrologically and ecologically up or down the way, it is a solution and it should be exempt in the process. That is the way forward. That is coming from someone who has been looking at bogs all his life.