Victor Boyhan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for the overview he gave. In summary, it is not working. Tailte Éireann is not delivering. People who want to do property transactions, whether for agricultural land, farms, pubs and commercial buildings, are having difficulties with Tailte Éirean and so are local authorities. It is simply not fit for purpose at this time. There is talk of a recruitment drive but this is after the body has been established. It acknowledges it needs a recruitment drive and training. We need to look at its IT systems. I am putting down a marker that this very day I am going to draft a number of parliamentary questions and submit them to colleagues in the Dáil I work closely with. Every week for the next five weeks there are going to be parliamentary questions put through Dáíl Éireann to draw out what the issues of concern are within this organisation.

I will finish by returning to the article, which stated "[Tailte Éireann] has told the solicitors' committee [of the Law Society] it is not an 'advisory body', cannot devote resources to checking every application for errors and intends to devote available staff to processing applications that are in order, according to the committee update". Quite frankly, Tailte Éireann has a responsibility to do more than that. If there are failings in the legislation we put through these Houses we need to look at that again. I am sending out a clear message it is not fit for purpose. I will today draft a number of parliamentary questions to submit to my colleagues in Dáil Éireann and I am going to keep on this case because Tailte Éireann is not doing what it should be doing.