Feargal Quinn (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State to the House. I had done some work on this very serious problem and had intended to call for an action plan from the Minister of State, but he has already done a great deal of work and I am very impressed. This work has included meeting the Minister in Northern Ireland, Michelle O'Neill, MLA, because it is an all-Ireland problem. It is also an all-Europe problem.

It seems likely the disease will spread rapidly as it has done in other parts of Europe. This will have huge knock-on effects for all of our rural areas. Trees and woodlands are very important in our ecosystems for capturing and storing carbon in cities to decrease air pollution, for recreation, for landscape aesthetics and, of course, for wildlife. It is amazing to consider that Lithuania has lost all its ash trees to the disease, and Denmark has lost nine out of ten of its ash trees. We have introduced restrictions on imports and I hope it is not too late.

The disease was recognised as far back as 2003. How many trees have we imported since then? In the UK, a recent summit found the best ways to tackle the disease were: better awareness raising and information gathering on issues such as leaf litter management; surveys and developing partnerships to continue disease and resistance surveillance and making use of volunteers in this regard; and focusing action on newly planted trees and not cutting down mature trees. These ideas are to be included in an action plan.

I am impressed with the amount of work done by the Minister of State and delighted to see it. However, we must give it our attention because it needs a wider focus. This also feeds into the fact we need more of a strategy in terms of not only preserving but renewing our woodland and hedgerows in the future. Perhaps this aspect was neglected during the good years. Do local authorities even bother with issues like Dutch elm disease or other tree diseases, or have resources become more scarce? I notice that ragwort, which is banned, seems to be everywhere throughout the country and along the roads. We have taken our eye off the ball on this, or perhaps it is not as serious a threat as it was in the past.

In the UK, a new website, ashtag.org, and a smartphone app were launched at the end of October to encourage the public to report trees showing symptoms. Can we do something similar here? It would be an example of using social media to contribute to addressing a serious problem.

Experience from Denmark and other badly affected countries suggested that street ash trees and those in parks are more likely to escape the disease than those in woodland. Because the disease is spread via spores on dead leaves, it might be practical to try to collect leaves from some trees. Do our plans include this? Unfortunately, the experience in other countries has shown it is almost impossible to fight the disease. Therefore, we must come up with some plans, as the Minister of State has done, to do with the dead or dying trees. If the situation does accelerate, what do we do with these trees? Could they be used for biomass energy or the firewood industry to generate heat and or electricity? This may be seen as a pessimistic view but I think we do have to plan.

We have certain EU regulations on importing dangerous plants but this experience shows we need more controls. Ireland's reputation has much to do with its food, forestry and nature, and we need to protect them. The Minister of State has taken a great many of the steps which need to be taken but an all-out effort is required on this issue. Senator Byrne spoke about the need to focus attention on a national effort and we need to do so. This is a very serious problem. The Minister of State has grabbed hold of it and let us ensure he gets the whole country behind him.