Martin Ferris (Kerry North-West Limerick, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Although it is not directly related to this legislation, the first thing that ought to be said in regard to forestry is to welcome the fact that the Government has ruled out the privatisation and sale of forestry and land under the responsibility of Coillte. It is evident that there was a plan in place to do so, and I am convinced that had it not been for the fact that those plans were highlighted publicly, we would have witnessed the selling off of those lands to private corporations. I commend those such as the woodland league and others who campaigned on this issue and ensured people were aware of what was going on. In particular, it was important that the role of a former Taoiseach, who was and perhaps still is employed by a private company interested in acquiring those lands, was brought to light. The notion that up to 7% of the land area of the State might have been sold off to an international investment fund, and that this might have been facilitated by a former elected Head of Government beggars belief. That is exactly what was being planned. Therefore, it is to be welcomed that the current Administration has ruled out such a shameful selling off of a natural resource vested in the State on behalf of the Irish people. However, there are still issues that need to be addressed in regard to the management of the public forestry and it may be possible to do so in the context of this Bill.

During the course of the debate on Coillte and the possible sale of the forests, a number of issues arose. It is not known, for example, to what extent public forests have already possibly been sold off to private interests. Similarly, we have not been given the details of the sale of Coillte lands at Bellanaboy to the Corrib consortium. Successive Ministers have avoided answering such questions under the absurd claim that Coillte is a private company and therefore not answerable to this House, or indeed to the Minister. Given that the two shareholders are the current Ministers for Finance and Agriculture, Food and the Marine, that claim is farcical. Coillte should be open to the same scrutiny as other public companies through the Departments under which it operates.

When Coillte executives appeared before a committee last year, I asked them about a geological survey that was carried out on Coillte lands. I asked this in the context of the then proposed sale of forestry and lands, as it was believed by some people that private investors were not only interested in the forests but had knowledge of possible mineral deposits under Coillte lands. At first they replied that there were surveys of quarries and such like only. I pressed them again with regard specifically to mineral deposits underground and they admitted that they had a "ball park"idea of where such deposits might be. Either they do or they do not. I would like the Minister of State therefore to state whether such a geological survey was undertaken and what its findings were and whether such information was taken into account when the sale of the forestry was being considered.

The Bill mainly concerns the public supervision of private forestry. As the Title states, its aim is to maximise among other objectives the economic value of the forests. In general terms, the Irish forestry sector is underdeveloped in comparison with other European states. Approximately 12,000 people are employed in the forestry sector. It is estimated that could increase by 50% over a ten year period if 15,000 hectares were planted each year. While just over half of the land under forest is under public ownership and, thus, within the remit of the State to develop, there is considerable potential within the private sector to expand the area under forest and the related enterprises associated with it. At present, we are well below the 15,000 hectare per year planting target. How to improve on that is the issue, and this Bill will impact directly on that, as would changes to the grant incentives to land owners to plant trees.

Concerns have been raised regarding the legislation by people who have land under forest, and among those concerns is the power to be granted to the Minister under section 6(e) to make compulsory purchases of land deemed "suitable for afforestation or other forestry related activities". In general I would have no problem with that where, for example, land is clearly lying fallow, perhaps adjacent to Coillte forestry, and where it could be used more productively for either forestry with a view to using the trees or even as part of a public amenity, but perhaps the wording is too vague and might be open to arbitrary compulsory purchases without the need to prove there is a public interest in so doing. Perhaps that section requires amendment to make more precise the circumstances under which a compulsory purchase might be made. We certainly do not want to have situations where, for example, land might be subject to a compulsory purchase order in order that it could be sold on to a commercial interest, as happened in the case of Bellanaboy, and as people have expressed concern in relation to wind farms.

I do not believe there can be too much objection to the Minister having an input into forestry plans, as proposed in section 6(b), as there needs to be central control over the manner in which forests in private ownership are used. There is perhaps scope for greater consultation between the Department and private owners in the framing of such plans. As part of a plan to extract more value from the forests with a view to expanding the overall sector, perhaps it might be an idea to hold a consultation with private owners to find out how individual plans for the use of the forests might be co-ordinated with a national plan. There is the question of whether such a plan exists, as one of the complaints against Coillte from people with a direct interest in the sector is that there is no overall plan, or if there is one, no one knows what it might be. Again that ties in with the overall perception and suspicion-----

See this speech in context