Martin Conway (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome all of our guests in the Gallery, in particular Councillor Adam Teskey. I commend and thank him for the phenomenal work he does for the people of his constituency in west Limerick.

The first issue I raise is the campaign by the Irish Farmers Association, IFA, regarding the various derogations from the nitrates directive. The simple point in this regard is that the goalposts keep changing. Farmers have gone above and beyond to be as efficient and environmentally friendly as possible. In many ways, they are guardians of the environment. I am thinking in particular of farmers in the Burren in County Clare and what they have done to protect and promote best environmental practice. Every year, the goalposts and criteria keep changing and new terms and conditions apply. We need a multi-annual programme to give farmers certainty because as matters stand, they do not know what the new criteria are from one year to the next. The small print always gets bigger. I am not talking font size here; it becomes more lengthy. One cannot run a business on that basis. It is completely unprofessional and it is not how business is done, certainly not how successful business is done. Until such time as the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine comes clean with farmers and sets multi-annual terms and conditions that give farmers certainty, we will continue to see a diminution in farm income, which will drive full-time farmers off the land, and farms will become part time.That is not good for rural Ireland or our economy and it is certainly not good for farming. We certainly do not want to see farming in this country become a part-time occupation.

On 6 December this year, I tabled a Commencement matter in this Chamber regarding the pilot scheme that was announced by the Minister almost 12 months ago at this stage in terms of sewerage schemes for County Clare. Numerous schemes have been submitted. In County Clare, Broadford and Cooraclare were submitted by Clare County Council as part of the call for expressions of interest. In the reply that was given on the record of this House, we were told it would happen in quarter 1 of this year. We are at the very end of quarter 1 now and as of yet, there has been no announcement on which schemes have been successful or not. This is dragging on. It is not good government and it is not good politics. In a situation where we have a housing crisis, and when we have developers prepared to put their hands in the pockets and build but who are not allowed to do so because it is premature development, we need these schemes over the line in order to repopulate parts of County Clare.