Malcolm Noonan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I move:

That the Committee do not agree with the Seanad in amendment No. 15 to the Wildlife (Amendment) Bill 2016 .

Amendments Nos. 15c1 and 15c2 are minor redrafts to better reflect the intention behind an Opposition amendment accepted and passed in the Seanad. Under the draft Bill, one of the factors to assess whether or not to de-designate a natural heritage area, NHA, is environmental criteria. The latter are defined in the Bill as meaning the conservation value of a bog, taking into account the area, range, habitat, structure, function and ecological features of the bog when compared to those of one or more than one other bog.

Amendment No. 15 from the Seanad cream list provided that where a comparison is made between raised bogs or blanket bogs in regard to environmental criteria, comparison shall not be made with a special area of conservation. The concern was that this criteria could give rise to many unnecessary de-designations if bogs were compared with some of the best examples of bogs around the country. In particular, Senators wanted to ensure that a Minister could not de-designate a bog on the basis of a comparison with a special area of conservation. This would not be the intention. As part of the 2014 natural heritage area review, special areas of conservation were included in the assessment of Ireland's raised bog resource. The special area of conservation sites were not used as comparators to justify the proposed de-designation of natural heritage areas and it is envisaged that they would not be used in the future for that purpose. In order to allay concerns expressed by Senators, it is proposed to amend the definition of "environmental criteria" set out in the Bill to explicitly provide that comparisons cannot be made with bogs situated in special areas of conservation.

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