Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

With respect to the Minister of State, the fact is a scheme will come after the legislation, whereas we should be looking at that before we pass the legislation. We talk about enabling legislation, but to enable us to trust the legislation, we need to know exactly what we are signing off on.

While I do not doubt the Minister of State’s personal interest in native forestry, the fact is the enabling legislation we create means we will enable any Minister of State in this area into the future. This is why it is significant in general when we are being asked to move issues out of primary legislation into potential future schemes or measures. Again, I note this particular amendment specifically introduces a time clause that suggests, for example, things would not be commencing until certain things have been done. The Minister of State might want to consider tabling her own amendment that would make it clear no parts of section 9 would commence until certain measures have been done and, as I will come to in some of my later amendments, certain schemes and measures have been done and, indeed, agreed by the House.

However, there is a wider issue and I am concerned. The Minister of State mentioned the SEA of the scheme, but we need to be clear, and again I made this point, that simply screening for a plan or a scheme and doing that strategic process does not substitute for the fact that screening is still needed, although it may be a different screening mechanism, and maybe a faster one. I wish we had poured resources into screening in the past year and a half because I believe we would be in a different place had we done so. However, we still need to screen projects and that has been really clear. There cannot be an exemption for screening projects. In fact, Ireland has already been found at issue in the European courts by attempting to apply a sized-based threshold in terms of saying we do not need to have a screening requirement or environmental impact assessment. That was case C-66/06 in 2008.

I am not trying to delay things. I am just trying to ensure they actually happen and this is done right. We again made these points on the heritage Bill, that if things are done right, you do not end up tied up at length in the processes. This is around moving through things and supporting them. The Minister of State has mentioned the idea of an SEA on the scheme, but we need to be clear, and I would like the Minister of State to illustrate she understands, that an SEA on the scheme will not be a substitute for screening for appropriate assessment and environmental impact assessment on projects. That is why we need to know what the mechanism will be for these things.

I am concerned the Minister of State is moving everything to the scheme. I would like to know if she is considering, for example, tabling amendments on Report Stage to address some of the four issues I have highlighted here, some of which could be addressed in the Bill and, for example, inserted as a condition, without which there would not be the commencement of section 9.Would we not have a system guaranteed in terms of providing visibility and tracking? Is that not something we want to make sure is in place before section 9 might be commenced in terms of compliance with the Aarhaus Convention and the environmental information directives? These are in fact sensible measures and if we are not using them, as in the forestry licensing scheme as matters stand, which I think is a mistake, but any parallel scheme we might create needs to have these same building blocks in there. We cannot sign off legislation that we do not know is compatible with EU law. Simply saying we will deal with it later does not deal with it, because if we remove the instruments we have in terms of the forestry licensing mechanism as the tool by which Ireland delivers its obligation under EU law, without having the other things or another system in place and already known, or attached to this Bill or put in primary legislation, then we are creating a lacuna. The Minister of State may have the good intent of filling but it is a lacuna nonetheless and another Minister may, for example, decide to have a very different kind of scheme that he or she may put in place.