Malcolm Noonan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

In relation to Senator Boyhan's point, I wish to give that commitment. The Senator is correct. The national marine planning framework has a dedicated chapter on heritage assets. The language used is that the Minister must have regard to it when preparing a marine planning policy statement. Whatever the current policy is, when the policy statement is prepared or whenever Heritage Ireland 2030 is implemented, it must have regard to the national marine planning framework. I am giving that assurance and I hope it is sufficient for the Senator.

It is critically important that the Senator raised this issue. As he said, this is not only natural heritage but cultural heritage. It is coastal communities which are part of our heritage. We cannot have a natural heritage without communities being part of that. We have good conversations with coastal communities in recent months on what they want to achieve out of this. There are coastal fishers, heritage fishers and many community groups involved in activities in coastal areas that require support and protection as well. We want to ensure that is included. It has been outlined well in the high-level report of the marine protected area advisory group led by Professor Tasman Crowe, as I said. That is very much reflected in the report.

In response to Senator Higgins, I again give that assurance around the marine protected areas and the marine framework. The marine protected areas are not a planning tool. They are features we are seeking to protect. The marine planning will have to adhere to that once we have the legislative part of it in place because we do not have a definition of marine protected areas in an Irish context. We want to do it specifically to an Irish context that recognises those coastal communities that we are talking about. In that regard, we are not saying that activities cannot take place in MPA zones but they may be limited to or have mitigation in place around certain species or features that we are trying to protect in those MPAs, be it the marine birds, corals or other features in the marine environment.

I give an assurance in that regard that these are interrelated and not separate processes. The work being done by the marine unit in the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, is interrelated with the planning side of it and with the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications. We are quite clear. We have gathered significant data on what we need to try and protect. As I said, the expert group report gave a large volume of information on how we do this in an Irish context. I give that assurance in relation to that.