Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputies Carthy and Browne for the amendment. This is already provided for in section 9(d) of the Bill with the requirement on the Minister to provide, by regulation, for a scheme to facilitate the planting of native tree areas. It is, therefore, provided in the Bill that the Minister would do that by way of regulation. This provides that the legislation to establish a scheme must be consistent with and based on the legislation adopted by the Oireachtas in the primary legislation, which we are considering in this Bill.

Furthermore, in advance of the development of a scheme, the Department will have to undertake a strategic environmental assessment. The strategic environmental assessment directive includes statutory legal requirements for the public to be able to participate in the process at specific stages to ensure there is transparency in the decision-making throughout the strategic environmental assessment process. The consultation process will engage with statutory authorities, outside bodies and the public. Members of the Oireachtas can also participate in this process to shape any future scheme. There is, therefore, much opportunity for engagement to help shape and look at the potential scheme from a number of different aspects, not just for Members of the Oireachtas but also for the wider public. It is very well covered already and, therefore, I do not see it as necessary to do that in terms of primary legislation.

If, for example, we were saying that a scheme such as this would have to be subject to Dáil approval, which basically means it would have to be voted on in the Dáil, then why would we not do the same for the targeted agricultural modernisation scheme, TAMS, the green low-carbon agri-environment scheme, GLAS, or any scheme a Minister would bring forward, not just in my Department but in any Department? It is overburdening the role of the Oireachtas and primary legislation when it is already being done by other means. We all know the challenge it is to get legislation into the Dáil. We know how long it took even for this legislation to find space and come through. If we were to bring other matters, which can be done in a more collaborative manner that is already provided for with processes in place to do so, then I do not believe it is a proportionate use of either primary legislation or the Dáil's time directly. It is excessive, overly bogged down in red tape and not conducive to productive government.

I absolutely see where the Deputies are coming from. I recognise the importance of collaboration to make sure the scheme is right and the primary legislation we are bringing forward today delivers the results we all want to see, which is more native trees, there are schemes to deliver that and also other subsidiary schemes in terms of incentives and grants and that we drive it on and make use of it.

Putting it in primary legislation would mean that every time we do something like that, in addition to all the other processes such as consultation through the strategic environmental assessment, we would need to have, for example, the capacity for regulation in a statutory instrument. It is unduly excessive to burden it with the red tape and Dáil time that would be involved, as proposed in this amendment. Again, if we were doing it for this, why not for so many other things?

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