Labhrás Ó Murchú (Fianna Fail)

As a co-founder of the Irish Rural Dwellers Association, I think this is a good and historic day for rural Ireland. The new guidelines the Minister has announced are in many ways a triumph of democracy over uncontrolled bureaucracy. Those people who live in an ivory tower, handing down dictates without a mandate to the ordinary people of Ireland, now have their answer. They seem to view rural Ireland as some kind of primitive reservation, a picnic venue they and their friends visit on a warm Sunday afternoon.