Sandra McLellan (Cork East, Sinn Fein)
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To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if he will give a guarantee that Coillte will continue to manage all of the State’s eleven forest parks and its one hundred and fifty recreational sites; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [8604/13]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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Coillte appears to be the flavour of the day. On the Deputy's question of whether Coillte will continue to manage all of the State's 11 forest parks and 150 recreational sites, the short answer is "Yes." I cannot make a long-term prediction in terms of the business model under which Coillte operates, but there is no intention on the part of the Government or my Department to move responsibility for the recreational management of vast forest estates from Coillte to another body. That is the current position. If at some stage in the future this changes because of policy on how we manage Coillte as an asset and semi-State company in conjunction with others, we will give due consideration to the matter. As of today, there is no plan to remove responsibility for the management of recreational sites or forest parks from Coillte. Coillte does a really good job in this area, particularly in recent years, through its opening up of considerable lands to walkways, cycle trails, wildlife, biodiversity and so on. It takes its responsibility in terms of environmental and ecological management seriously. Our considerations in regard to Coillte relate to the sale of commercial timber which will be felled in the future for financial return. That is what is being looked at. In that context, we are seeking to protect the amenity and access value of parkland and mature forest which will never be felled.

Martin Ferris (Kerry North-West Limerick, Sinn Fein)
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I agree fully that the management of the recreational sites has been hugely beneficial to ordinary citizens and from a tourist perspective. However, if the sale of the commercial entity, in terms of harvesting rights, comes into conflict with the recreational entity, how does the Minister propose to deal with the matter? He has stated that as of now the intention is to protect this aspect of Coillte's operations, but it is not evident from his response that this will not change. There is evidence to the contrary.

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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I have consistently said throughout the debate on the harvesting rights issue that we want to do two things. First, we need to protect the asset, in terms of woodland, parkland, public access, trails, cycle ways and other amenities, that is the national forest estate that is of real public interest. Second, we need to ensure the industry that has been built up in accessing timber from Coillte forests remains intact.

In the context of any sale, those considerations are paramount and they will remain so. I hope I have some credibility when I say that we do not want to undermine the public access to mature and not so mature forests and the amenities in which Coillte has invested and built up, particularly in recent years but also during the past number of decades. The Deputies will have to accept my word for it when I say that the policy we are currently considering will protect that asset because it is a valuable State asset that we should not compromise. I cannot be any clearer than that.

Michael Kitt (Galway East, Fianna Fail)
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Deputies O'Donovan, Boyd Barrett, Wallace and Luke 'Ming' Flanagan have indicated they wish to speak on this. I call Deputy O'Donovan.

Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick, Fine Gael)
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I welcome the Minister's commitment in this regard. It is very important. There are several State-owned forests in my constitutency. The partnership model that has been developed by the local authorities, the Leader companies, the Department of Tourism, Culture and Sport, Fáilte Ireland and other such bodies is important. The Ballyhoura Mountains in my area of south Limerick is a prime example of where recreation can sit cheek by jowl with the commercial aspect of the forest.

As we move forward with this, will the Minister examine the partnership model that is in place throughout the country with a view to ensuring that his colleague, the Minister for Tourism, Culture and Sport, the sports partnerships, the local authorities and everybody else, including the people who use the forests, form part of a consultative process? There is a good deal of misinformation and scaremongering about what is in effect the sale of timber and people are drawing every sort of a red herring into it. The assurances the Minister has given in the Dail today go some way towards allaying those fears. I ask that such a consultative process would continue at local level.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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The Minister's most recent response is the most worrying I have heard yet. He said he is giving assurances and then he said that things might change in the future. How can we be confident of his assurances that public access to State forestry will be protected if the profitable part of Coillte's business is sold off and the State is left holding the baby in terms of the public amenity element? If the revenue-generating element of State forestry is sold off to the private sector, it seems that either we will forced to sell the public amenities later or we will be forced to start charging for admission to those amenities, both of which would be utterly unacceptable. To my mind, the best thing the Minister could do is abandon this sad and sorry plan.

Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent)
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I would like the Minister to clarify a few points. Am I right in thinking he is saying that under no circumstances will we sell anything under foot? Given that he has a pretty good handle on what is happening in Coillte, he has been involved in this area for a good while and given the information he has to date, what is his lowest price for the sale of the harvesting rights? Can he give a guarantee that for as long as he is a Minister during the term of this Dáil he will not agree to the privatisation of Coillte?

Luke Flanagan (Roscommon-South Leitrim, Independent)
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If at the end of this process the Minister rightfully decides not to sell Coillte, what is the plan then? What will he do with this company that got 7% of our land 22 years ago and that has made such a massive success of it that it is hundreds of millions of euro in debt, cannot pay its staff pensions and it brought back to the State only one dividend of €10 million which it accrued by selling part of the land it got for nothing in the first place? If at the end of this process the Minister decides he will not sell it, what will he do to make sure that this very badly run company is run better?

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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I will deal with Deputy Luke 'Ming' Flanagan's questions first. It is not appropriate to answer the question he posed until we make a decision on the sale. It is important to say that Coillte, like every semi-State company in Ireland, is going through a reform process to reduce its cost base which it needs to go through; it has been doing that to become more commercially viable, and that process will continue. However, this issue is a huge factor in the future decision-making around Coillte as regards its asset base. We need to bring some certainty to that issue and we will do that pretty quickly.

On Deputy Wallace's questions, there was never a proposal to sell any land under foot that Coillte currently owns as part of Government policy and that is still the case. The Deputy asked what is the lowest price for the sale of the harvesting rights. That is a question to which he will get an answer when a Government decision is made on this. There are no plans to privatise Coillte as a company.

On Deputy Boyd Barrett's questions, in terms of the idea that one cannot sell an asset and allow a company to survive because it loses such a large asset, forests will still need to be serviced and managed, there will be contracts in place if there is a new owner-----

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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How will we fund them?

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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-----and such management will need to be funded by any potential new owner. Forests have been sold previously; this is not rocket science. They will need to be managed, harvested in time and in the meantime the thinings need to be managed. That will involve a service contract that will be in place if there is a new owner, which obviously Coillte is likely to be involved in. Let us deal with these questions in some detail either here or in committee when the Government makes a decision on this issue.

On Deputy O'Donovan's questions, the partnership model is quite a good one that we need to consider. I am a regular user of Coillte forests from a recreational point of view in places like Currabinny and Farran. I regularly take my dog for a run there-----

Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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Or he takes the Minister.

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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-----or he takes me, to try to forget about the madness of my job sometimes. I am more than aware of the value to the communities of these extraordinary natural resources and we are not going to compromise those.