Paudie Coffey (Fine Gael)

I would ask the Minister of State to note the following general comment. Representatives of turf cutters made presentations last week to the Joint Committee on the Environment, Heritage and Local Government. They made a reasonable argument on the matter of conservation areas. These are the people who live and were reared on the land. It is important we note their views and that they are not lost. There is an important drive towards conservation and preservation, but it is also important we take account of the native people who were born and bred in these areas. We are talking about wildlife in this section but I would argue that we should also give due consideration to native inhabitants of rural Ireland and the practices they have carried out over generations. The representatives of the turf cutters made the reasonable argument about how they have contributed to the preservation of the wildlife and the countryside in which they live.

While I understand the importance of the existence of the special areas of conservation, the way their boundaries are drawn needs to be reviewed. If one looks at the maps where they are delineated or marked, they normally follow, for example, a stream or a river course. They follow natural boundaries or fence lines. Sometimes they move out across roadsides into fields and back down again, and there seems to be no logic to some of the areas included in special areas of conservation. If a planning application is made within those areas, local authorities automatically deem them unacceptable because they are in this hatched area which is a special area of conservation. However, when such a hatched area was being established on day one, there was no proper analysis of its boundaries. It creates many difficulties and much bureaucracy within the planning process. It is an area that needs to be revisited to come up with a better system of clearly delineating and understanding special areas of conservation on maps. There are many areas that should not be marked as special areas of conservation. If one analyses the maps, they jump outside areas that have any relevance to the protection of wildlife or special areas around rivers or streams. I have not tabled an amendment in this regard, but I wanted to make that general comment.

I ask the Minister of State and his officials to take account of what I am saying because such areas do cause problems for planning authorities. There should be a better system whereby such areas could be reviewed by local authorities on a phased basis if resources are a problem. They should not be a problem now, however, because planning authorities do not have the workload they had heretofore. This may be an opportune time to revise special areas of conservation to see that they are being appropriately allocated for the reasons they were initially created.