Carol Nolan (Laois-Offaly, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The land grab and shameful deal between Gresham House holdings and Coillte is an insult to people the length and breadth of this island. It is yet again another attack on our sovereignty as a republic. A halt should be called to this deal without delay. I ask the Minister of State to do the right thing. People have expressed serious concern right across the party spectrum. The Minister of State's job should be to listen and engage. The Minister said this is not the preferred deal. If it is not the preferred deal, why in the name of God would the Government sell us out? Why would it cause a land grab? Why would it turn its back on farming families and communities the length and breadth of this State who are vehemently opposed to such a deal? It is an absolute sell-out and needs to be stopped.

I will give a flavour of some of the forestry and farming organisations that are opposed to the Coillte deal. They include the Irish Farmers' Association, Macra na Feirme, Western Forestry Co-op, Irish Forest Owners, the Social, Economic Environmental Forestry Association, SEEFA, the Forest Owners Co-operative Society, the Association of Irish Forestry Consultants, the Agricultural Consultants Association, and Limerick and Tipperary Woodland Owners. That is just a flavour of some of the organisations against this deal. I ask the Minister of State to please listen to them. Does any of this opposition, given its scale and breadth right across farming and forestry, give the Minister or this Government any pause? Does it raise any doubts at all? Does it not signal that the approach being taken by Coillte is not just inappropriate but almost amounts to a breach of the social contract and is most certainly a betrayal of the people?

Last Thursday, all the organisations I mentioned issued a statement. It states quite clearly that, "The recent announcement by Coillte that it has joined forces with a major foreign investment house to establish a fund to acquire 12,000ha [of] forests and bare land is strongly opposed by the majority of the main organisations in the agriculture and forest sector." They go on to say it is their view that, "This is the first step in Coillte’s strategic vision to act as an agent on behalf of foreign and national investment funds to transition 100,000 ha of Irish farmland out of local farm ownership for afforestation by funds [and funds for profit]." Of course, the taxpayer is used in all that to the tune of €2.1 billion. The statement continues, "The most saddening part is that this venture is being enabled by the Irish taxpayer to the tune of €2.1 billion of Irish taxpayers’ money". Most of them are opposed to this deal.

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