Michael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The Taoiseach said first that the Government supports the proposal, and then he said it has grave concerns. If it has grave concerns, how is it that every other country, including the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden, has written back already and most of the countries in the EU have written back opposing this in is present form? Why have we not written back and outlined the things in it that the Government is concerned about? We had representatives of the Directorate General for Environment, DG ENV, before our agriculture committee last week. They are not concerned about the Government doing an analysis in Ireland. They made very clear to us at the committee that they had taken an overall look at this. When we asked them what the consequences of this will be in Ireland, they said they look at it on an overall basis, not country by country. We are unique in this regard. I ask the Taoiseach to put a halt to what is going on. The Government should not ratify this or the Taoiseach and his Government will be the cause of small family farms in the west, north west and south west of Ireland being driven out of business on account of this. There is time for the Taoiseach to act and I ask him to do so.

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