Brian Ó Domhnaill (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I am trying to distinguish between the two. There are people who destroy plantations. They should be dealt with differently from someone who gets a felling licence.

I spoke last evening to a forest farmer in County Cavan, Howard McCallum, who is a friend of my colleague, Senator Wilson. He wanted to raise this issue because he knows many young farmers who are interested in planting their land but who do not want to take on the responsibility of planting because a felling licence will attach the condition of having to replant. If they want to diversify into other agricultural activities in five or ten years’ time they cannot do that. It was fine back in 1946 when the planting policy was for only 4,000 ha. In 1970 a total of 2.6% of land was under trees. Today that figure is 10.6%. We are dealing with apples and pears. The situation is different. I welcome the modernisation of the legislation but we need to modernise this aspect of it too.

Senator Barrett’s amendment draws this into the open. It is a good amendment and I support it in respect of trees being felled or otherwise removed without a licence but there should be flexibility where trees are felled with a licence.