Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
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302. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine when he expects the Forestry (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2020 to be fully implemented; the impact he expects to have on the timeframe for forestry felling appeals; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [30611/20]

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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The Forestry (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2020 was signed into law by the President on 2^ndOctober 2020 and the Act commenced on 6^thOctober 2020 in full. The secondary legislation required to give effect to the Act was implemented on Wednesday 8th October.

The new Act, amending the Agriculture Appeals Act was designed to align forestry licensing appeals process with best practice in other appeals processes.

The Act provides a number of mechanisms to improve the efficiency and delivery of services to stakeholders by:

- Increasing the capacity of the Forestry Appeals Committee (FAC) to determine appeals by enabling it to sit in divisions of itself;

- Enabling the FAC to determine appeals without an oral hearing where it is possible to properly dispose of an appeal in that manner;

- Introducing fees for appeals, by means of regulation;

- Allowing all interested parties to appeal directly to the FAC, with no restrictions on access.

I have now moved to resource the FAC to commence hearing more appeals in line with the provisions set out in the Act. It will be a matter for the FAC to report on their own progress and they update their decisions weekly on their own website.

I believe that the provisions in the Act, along with our Project Plans for managing the licensing backlog, will greatly improve the overall system and result in an increase in the number of licences available for planting and felling and decision-making system which is more fit for purpose and meets the needs of all stakeholders.