Fiona O'Loughlin (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

This time two years ago I hosted the Network Ireland national executive here in Leinster House. It was a really good opportunity to engage with them about their vision and plans. It is an excellent networking group for women. At the time, the then president, Emma Early Murphy, spoke about her plans for developing an all-island programme of events for women in business and culture and the arts. On International Women's Day this coming Saturday, the first all-island business women's network day will take place in Croke Park. I wish them well. The current president, Amy O'Sullivan, is spearheading this. Women are coming from the Thirty-two Counties of the island of Ireland. I wish them well in this endeavour and have no doubt we will hear lots more from them. They are supporting Debra Ireland as their charity.

The drama festival season is starting now. As a young person growing up in a town that valued drama, I had the opportunity to go to local drama groups and those that had travelled from all over Ireland to the towns of Rathangan and Kildare. It was always a wonderful time to learn about culture and drama and to be able to step into another home, another country and so on. The Rathangan and Kildare drama festivals are both starting in the next two weeks. I wish them well. The national secretary, Mairead Broderick, is a resident of Rathangan and does tremendous work at national level as well as at local level.

At the moment there is no national policy on solar farms in terms of planning and so on. While we want to see the growth of sustainable energy options, it is important that there be balance. At the moment in Kildare we seem to have approximately 25% of the solar farms that have been given planning permission. There is also planning for another 600 acres just outside Clane, which is two square miles. The issue here is that it is using good farmland. Given all the farm buildings we have around the country, stables, sheds and so on, we should be able to incentivise people to put solar on the actual buildings as opposed to using good farmland. Italy has banned solar on agricultural land to try to preserve its productive agricultural land. We need to a debate in this House and I would appreciate if the Leader would ask the Minister for agriculture to oblige us.