Can the Minister indicate at this stage what relationship there is to be between the coming into operation of this legislation and the establishment of the council as provided for in section 13?
SECTION 1.
Question proposed: " That section I stand part of the Bill."
I presume that the Deputy wishes to know when it is proposed to establish the council. I should hope to establish it with the minimum delay after the enactment of the Bill.
Am I right in assuming that the series of events will be as follows: after the Bill becomes law the Minister will fix a day or days on which it is to come into operation and then he will make an order establishing the council?
That is correct.
In other words, he will first have to make an order bringing the Bill into operation and then an order establishing the council?
Yes. The date for each may be different.
In relation to subsection (3), is the procedure here not unusual? What is the purpose of taking sections of this Bill and quoting them with the Forestry Acts?
Subsection (3) provides for the collective citation of sections 55 and 63 of this Bill with the Forestry Act of 1946 and 1956 because of the latter's close links with this Bill. Section 55 provides a new procedure for the acquisition of land for forestry for the purposes of the Bill. In other words, we are providing a new, and I hope, satisfactory way of acquiring land and we are applying the same procedure to the acquisition of land under the Forestry Acts. Therefore we are substituting section 55 of this Bill for a section of the Forestry Act, 1946-56.
Is the position then that the provisions in the 1956 Act for the acquisition of land will also be used for the acquisition of land for ordinary forestry purposes—I mean, the substituted provision in this Bill?
We are availing of this opportunity to update the provisions. We are aiming to improve and simplify the method for acquiring land for forestry purposes.
Is that within the terms of the Long Title?
It is to enable refuges to be acquired for flora and fauna.
That is not what the Minister said. He said section 55 of this Bill will be used to acquire land for ordinary forestry purposes.
Surely it is concomitant.
Under the guise of this Bill, what we are ordaining is that land can be acquired under its terms which need not necessarily go to the purpose for which the Bill was introduced. That seems strange, to say the least of it. Provision is being made in this Bill for the acquisition of certain lands, ostensibly for the purpose of wildlife and conservation but we now know that it may and probably will happen that lands will be acquired under the provisions of the Bill for ordinary forestry purposes.
No. We are availing of this Bill to amend machinery in the Forestry Acts, to improve sections in the Forestry Acts for acquiring land but we are acquiring land under this Bill and we are acquiring it under the Forestry Acts for the purpose of those Acts but we intend to use the same machinery——
Can we be assured that no land will be acquired under this Bill for ordinary forestry purposes?
The Deputy may be assured it can be used only for the purposes of this Bill.
That is the opposite to what the Minister said.
I said we are amending the sections of the Forestry Acts relating to the acquisition of this land. If the Deputy will bear with us until we come to the section we can then deal more fully with it.
We will agree to leave the argument over until we come to section 55. It struck me and, I think, the Chairman, with his encyclopaedic knowledge of parliamentary drafting, that it is a bit unusual to have a situation where you add to the Forestry Acts of 1946 to 1956 sections 55 and 63 of this Bill and that, in combination, will be known as the Forestry Acts, 1956 to 1965, and this Act will be quoted as the Wildlife Act of 1975 or 1976. When one cites the Wildlife Act, 1976 will one exclude sections 55 and 63 from the citation?
These two sections will be common to both citations?
That will appear perfectly clear to Deputies when we come to sections 55 and 63.
The question of citation arises. We can leave over argument on section 55 but here in subsection (3) of this section we are dealing with the citation and the Chairman, as a lawyer, might have a view on it. I think it is a departure to cite the Wildlife Act, 1976, including in that citation sections 55 and 63 and also the Forestry Acts, 1946 to 1956.
There are numerous examples of that in our statutes. There are examples of Acts impinging on other Acts. Wildlife is intimately concerned with forestry. As the Minister said, it would be well to leave it until we come to the particular sections and see what the implications are.
Is the Minister then giving us a categoric assurance that sections 55 and 63 of this Bill will be cited under both generic terms—when one cites the Wildlife Act, 1976 one will include these sections and the Forestry Acts?
Subsection (1) of this section states that this Act may be cited as the Wildlife Act, 1975 and subsection (3) states:
The Forestry Acts, 1946 and 1956 and sections 55 and 63 of this Act may be cited together as the Forestry Act, 1946 to 1975.
They impinge on each other.
People may be trying to find bits of one Act in bits of another.
Reference books would tell them that sections 55 and 63 of this Act amend the Forestry Acts of 1946 to 1956. Of course lawyers long for the day when they can get the entire unamended statute dealing with one subject.
In reference to Deputy O'Leary's query, there is an annual publication which gives the cross-reference to one Act impinging on another.
Would that be available to officials of the Forestry Division?
Yes, and to all lawyers. It is a Government publication which comes out every year.
I regard it as undesirable. I have had some experience of law reform and the consolidation of different Acts. I think it bad practice to lump two sections out of one Act into a general citation under two other Acts. Deputy O'Leary has a very good point.
Could we take it de bene esse and then proceed with the other sections when we come to them, when we would deal with them fully?
We will not be dealing again with the matter of citation. Once we have dealt with this section the question of the citation of this Bill is finished and done with. It is in that respect that Deputy O'Leary and I are concerned. I do not propose to make any more fuss about it but I do not think it good parliamentary practice to have this sort of common citation in two sections, which would normally be included in the citation of the Wildlife Bill, 1975, finding themselves also included in the other citation. That is all I want to say about it.
Question put and agreed to.