Mark Daly (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister to the House and on behalf of my colleague, Senator O'Sullivan, intend to question him regarding the bogs around Listowel in his own constituency and to ask him to provide Members with an update in that regard. I have listened to colleagues opposite outlining the process of how this situation has been reached. They spoke of directives, derogations that were sought, national strategy plans and special areas of conservation, SACs, and an article I wrote struck me. It was on how 2% of the laws in Ireland are made in Leinster House. Most laws are made by Ministers signing European Union directives into Irish law. This particular directive lay inside Departments when my party and others were in government and no one examined it for ten years. It was deemed to be a problem for the next crowd and by the time it became critical, Ireland's leeway for manoeuvre was gone. Moreover, even before that, at the time when the directive was being designed across Europe, Ireland's engagement with Europe was minimal, if anything. I know this from a comment made by the former Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, who stated he did not know how many officials in the Departments actually look at such EU directives. That should tell one how badly Ireland examines such matters and now, 25 years later, they have become a huge problem for people and citizens on the ground.

This is an entire failure of process. Many times in this Chamber, it has been argued how badly European Union scrutiny is carried out here. This issue is an example of how bad EU scrutiny affects people on the ground. A position has arisen in which military aircraft are being used to oversee the bogs. Election promises were made, albeit not by the Minister, Deputy Deenihan. However, Deputy Feighan stated he would sign in his blood the future of turf cutting.