Michael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-South Leitrim, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I agree that talking can resolve issues, but if only 48 people have been accommodated over the past 17 years, where will we be after the next 17 years? The people who want to cut turf do not want the money and the people in the Department must get this into their heads. People have cut turf and will continue to do so if the people in the Department keeps burying their heads in the sand.

I am well aware of local authorities on tight budgets rationing funds to provide the best road surface to taxpayers, especially in the west. I have spoken to directors of services throughout the country on the issue of roads who are almost crying on the phone because of what the Minister's staff are doing to them. When a road is being built, it seems it is less important than the bird or the ditch which is a so-called SAC. I challenge the SACs because I have asked for ten years for proof that these areas are SACs. In several parts of Ireland the Department's staff in the National Parks and Wildlife Service are terrorising local authority staff trying to build roads-----

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