Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy. I have a policy on never commenting on somebody, whether they look pregnant or not. Even if they are close to giving birth, I still never comment and leave it as a matter for themselves. Of course, one can never tell the state of another person's pregnancy. I am not trying to be facetious in any way. The Deputy has raised an interesting analysis of the licence application and the Act. I am not in a position to make any sort of legal determination or adjudication on the issue but she has taken an unusually interesting angle on the issue. She has said that the licence conditions refer to hares that are pregnant. A person or a hare is either pregnant or not in the same way they are dead or not. There is no ambiguity in the matter. This raises important questions for licensing.

I am instructed by the Department to reply that regulated hare coursing is administered by the ICC, as the Deputy will be aware. As I am sure she will be also aware, statutory responsibility for the Greyhound Industry Act resides with the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine. Licences are required by the ICC under the terms of the Wildlife Acts on behalf of their affiliated clubs to facilitate the capture of hares. Regulated coursing meetings take place during the open season dates between 26 September and end of February of the following year.

The ICC applies to the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage on an annual basis for each of the aforementioned licences. Where licences are approved by the Minister, the conditions of same are set out and communicated with the ICC, as the Deputy has set out. Regional officers of the National Parks and Wildlife Service, NPWS, attend coursing meetings, as resources allow, to monitor compliance with the conditions of the licenses. I am not sure how they assess the matter the Deputy has raised. Did I heard her correctly stating that the matter in question falls under section 10 of the licence?

See this speech in context