Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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542. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if there are plans to release funding to landowners and local authorities to enable potentially dangerous trees to be made safe and for all trees near power lines and building to be felled/made safe, in view of the number of storms and their impact the country has experienced in recent years; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [9569/25]

Peter Cleere (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fianna Fail)
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580. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine if there are plans to release funding to landowners and local authorities to enable potentially dangerous trees to be made safe and for all trees near power lines and building to be felled and made safe, in view of the number of storms and their impact the country has experienced in recent years; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [9603/25]

Martin Heydon (Kildare South, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 542 and 580 together.

One of the actions for my Department in the Programme for Government is to work collaboratively with the ESB to support and accelerate the timber and vegetation clearance programme, and I am fully committed to this process.

I, along with my colleagues, Ministers Healy-Rae and O’Brien, have established a Working Group to consider the issues that have arisen from recent storms in relation to the interaction of forests with power lines. It has held two meetings most recently last Friday and the ESB is drawing up a plan to improve the resilience of the grid ahead of winter 2025. Consideration is also being given to the extent of the powers available to the ESB to, for example, pre-emptively widen corridors, as well as the way in which the issue of compensation for forest owners is dealt with.

These matters are also being discussed in the Forest Windblow Taskforce, which is chaired by Minister Healy-Rae and whose primary focus is the safe and appropriate management of storm-damaged forests.

The care and management of trees adjacent to roads is the responsibility of the landowner on whose land the roadside trees are growing. It is advisable that landowners make themselves aware of the full legal extent of their land ownership and of any obligations arising from this.

My Department does not offer funding for the removal of roadside trees or trees outside of forests for ash or any other species, but has published guidance on the subject of roadside trees (“A Guide for Landowners to Managing Roadside Trees”). This publication provides information on how to identify trees that have ash dieback and outlines specific issues related to health and safety in tree work.

Section 70 of the Roads Act 1993 sets out the responsibility of landowners to take all reasonable steps to ensure that trees, hedges and other vegetation growing on their land are not, or could not become, a danger to people using a public road or interfere with the safe use of a public road or the maintenance of a public road. The implementation of the legislation on the management or removal of dangerous roadside trees is the responsibility of the local authority, in its capacity as the relevant road authority.