Mr. Simon White:

That is a debatable question. Personally, I do not feel it is illegal to cut down dead trees except the issue is what you will cut them down with? We are not allowed cut them now because they are deemed dangerous. I had to cut them down with chainsaws, so you would have to go to the expense of cutting them down with big expensive machinery. It will cost a lot of money to do it. As regards the legalities of it, that is one of the problems that is there. Again, it is not so much the legality of cutting down the trees, it is that you have to replant and the question is how long it will be before the land can be used. We have people who have cut down trees and they are under terrible pressure to replant. Not necessarily in cases of ash dieback but some people have tried to put land back to grass and they then have been fined until such time as they replant. It is a major issue but it is not the issue that worries us. What we say is that we do not need a licence to cut down a tree because logically that does not make sense. All we need is permission from the State. There is a huge list of statutory instruments that have been passed by this Minister, on forestry and everything, to deal with the new forestry programme. It is impossible to understand them. I am an environmental scientist but I am not an environmental lawyer and quite honestly I do not understand them. There is a huge number of them allowing all the things the Department wants, such as Gresham House being able to buy this; Coillte being able to get grants. All those things can be done. Why can the Department not do something simple which allows us to go out and cut down these dangerous trees and get on with getting this land back into production? We asked for that back in the spring and the Minister flat out told us "No". He said it would be reviewed. We have got the review. We needed it. All the Department has to do is act and take decisions. There is a total lack of leadership and decision-making. We cannot make decisions on our own. We have been paralysed for years by this. We just want to work and to get the job done. The Department has to make the decisions. The job of the committee members is to put pressure on the Department and the Ministers to make those decisions and to govern. They are members of Government; they are in charge. The committee needs to get them to do it. If they will not do it, they will not be in Government the next time around.