asked the Minister for Lands if he will arrange with the Land Commission to divide the Cunningham and Phelan Estates at Ballygeehan, Ballacerea, County Laois in the spring of 1976.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Laois Estates.
22.
(Cavan): Composite resale proposals are envisaged for the two properties referred to. As yet I am unable to indicate when division will take place but every effort will be made to dispose of the lands as early as possible.
I am at a disadvantage because the reply to Question No. 19 is in the form of a tabular statement. May I ask the Minister in relation to this and the supplementary he gave later when he told us the target for lands to be reallocated in the coming year——
(Cavan): 1,600 acres.
Are those two estates included in the target of 1,600 acres?
(Cavan): I cannot tell the Deputy that. He will know when he reads the tabular statement.
I gave notice of this question some time ago because I wanted to know if the Minister would arrange with the Land Commission to divide that land, but he stated that he cannot——
(Cavan): If it would help the Deputy I can tell him that the problem of this 224 acre estate was that there was a very limited road frontage. To divide it with that road frontage would have been very difficult. That land came into the possession of the Land Commission in 1972. In order to do a better job the commission went after another estate in the immediate vicinity and got possession of it only in January, 1975. It will now be possible to divide the two estates to much better advantage than it would have been to divide the estate mentioned in the question on its own.
There were two estates mentioned in the question—the original estate and the one got subsequently.
(Cavan): The second estate came into the possession of the Land Commission in January of this year.
Will it be divided in the coming spring?
(Cavan): The Deputy may take it that it will be divided at the earliest possible moment.
But not in the coming spring?
(Cavan): That information is not stated in my brief.
Is this not unusual when one has already given notice of a question? I understood that parliamentary questions were put down to elicit information.
(Cavan): That is so, but the Deputy may take it that it is unlikely that the estate will be divided in the spring of 1976.