Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am glad to have the opportunity to talk about this topic. I have no grudge against anyone in farms being planted with a grove or a hedge. Indeed, I have done it myself. As has been said, farmers have always been doing it. Where I come from, everywhere anyone looks there are too many trees and bushes and they are growing. There are plenty of them in our neck of the woods. Despite talk about paying farmers to do it, everyone in this House knows that that is not going to happen any time soon. For years we have been asking for a grant for the planting of trees on marginal land, but it has been refused. The Government has refused it and there is no hope it will change its mind any time soon. That is the truth of the matter.

It is galling to think farmers are not getting a fair price for their cattle. There was a lot of talk about Mercosur and we know what is happening in South America, where trees are being cut down. We have been asked by the man in Europe, Mr. Hogan, to plant trees and get rid of some of our cattle. It is emotive to talk to farmers tonight and tell them that it is advisable to plant trees. They know the amount they can plant on their land. If they have a small farm, they will do so much and if they have a bigger farm, they will do a bit more. However, despite being told that they are going to be paid to do it, I do not believe it. Today, yesterday and every other day, we have been asking the Government to pay for home helps, but it does not have the money to pay for the home help or the fair deal scheme. Therefore, from where is it going to get the money to pay farmers to plant more trees? That is the honest truth. Do not cod the people because they are not to be codded anymore. They know what the Government is at and that it is only talk. There is all this talk about climate change and there are parties tripping over each other in this House to see which of them will be as green as the Greens, or greener if they could be.

There was a professor who stated 15 years ago that cows were creating a savage amount of methane gas. Three weeks ago he admitted that he was wrong and that they were not actually creating one third of what he had claimed. NASA admits that climate change occurs because of changes in the Earth's solar orbit, as the distance between the sun and the Earth increases and decreases at times.

That is the cause of climate change, not the poor farmer-----

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