Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the comments made in respect of the biodiversity citizens’ assembly articulated by Deputies McDonald and Christopher O’Sullivan. I take the point that we need to do more in a review of the NPWS and indeed the agri-environmental scheme. We need to work on this as that is why the carbon tax is important to provide funding for that agri-environmental scheme.

On the citizens’ assembly on drugs, raised by Deputies Ó Ríordáin and Hourigan, I said that this would not happen until the latter part of the year but in the interim, and not just interim, officials in my office are working and endeavouring to recreate an area-based partnership approach in key areas that are suffering the most from the drugs epidemic and the impact it is having on communities. We need to revert back to the old RAPID approach of drug task force areas where we need a multidisciplinary and multi-pronged approach across Departments and agencies from the bottom up to deal with much of what is happening on the ground right now.

We are not waiting for the citizens’ assembly to do work on the drugs issue but the intention is that we have the drugs citizens’ assembly set up in the latter part of this year.

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