Seán Sherlock (Cork East, Labour)
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901. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine when new legislation on forestry will be brought forward. [24155/20]

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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At its meeting of 27 July, the Government approved my Memorandum seeking approval to draft an urgent amendment to the Agriculture Appeals Act, 2001 along the lines of the Heads of Bill presented. This will reform the forestry appeals process by bringing it into line with similar planning processes and is one of the commitments in the Programme for Government.

I have subsequently published the draft Bill for public consultation on 30 July for a four-week period with a closing date on Friday 28^thAugust. My officials are currently reviewing nearly 9,000 submissions on the draft Bill received by the closing date and, in parallel, work is ongoing with the OPC on further drafting of the Bill with a view to its presentation to the Houses of the Oireachtas as soon as possible.