Trevor Ó Clochartaigh (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 31:

In page 23, line 8, after “officers” to insert “competent in the area of forestry regulation”.

This is a small amendment in the area of enforcement relating to officers authorised to enforce the law. Section 23(1) states: "The Minister may appoint such and so many persons as he or she considers appropriate to be authorised officers for the purposes of the enforcement of all or any of the relevant statutory provisions." We believe the relevant officers should be competent in the area of forestry regulation. I imagine the preference of the Minister of State would be for anyone who is to enforce these regulations to be competent but we cannot preclude the possibility that, in future, someone may be sent out who is ill-qualified or incompetent in the area of forestry regulation.
In recent years civil servants have moved between Departments and offices. People who may not have a track record in a particular area have gone to a different section of a Department and so forth. We have even seen people from JobBridge taken on by Departments. I had a question on the Adjournment one day relating to the Department of Justice and Equality, which took on a large number of people to clear the backlog in processing driving licences, for example. Who is to know who the authorised officers appointed in future by the Minister will be? It is only prudent and fair to the people working in the industry and to all the stakeholders involved as well as for good compliance to have people who are competent in the area of forestry regulation. We cannot see why the Minister of State would oppose that.