Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 14 October 2014
81. Deputy Éamon Ó Cuív asked the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine when a decision will be made in respect of grazing rights on Glenahiry commonage in Clonmel (details supplied), that is the subject of a review by the legal unit of his Department; if the legal unit of his Department has provided an opinion on this matter to date; the reason for the delay in deciding this review; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [38908/14]
View answerIt is important to point out that one of the primary provisions of the EU regulations governing payments under the Single Payment Scheme, the Disadvantaged Areas Scheme and other area-based schemes is that the area of land declared by individual applicants must not exceed the total eligible area, as defined in the Regulations. Commission Regulation (EC) No 1122/2009 (which replaced Commission Regulation (EC) No 796/2004) provides that where there is an over-declaration, applicants are not entitled to benefit from payment until the over-claim is resolved. This provision has been implemented in Ireland since the introduction of the Single Payment Scheme, in 2005. In practice where any land parcel is claimed beyond its confirmed size in hectares an ‘over-claim’ is flagged and payment is withheld pending resolution of that over-claim. In the case of Glenahiry commonage, more land than is contained in the entire commonage has been claimed by applicants, since 2005. All applicants have confirmed their rights to claim certain shares of the Glenahiry commonage. Consequently, this is a legal dispute over rights to the commonage.
Furthermore, my Department has no jurisdiction in relation to disputes over Title, Ownership or grazing claims to land. All parties to this dispute have been made aware of this. The law on incorporeal hereditaments is very complex. The establishment and loss of same is governed by the prescription acts and common law. In this case Legal Title is based on a Land Commission Vesting Order dated 30th June 1950. Some parties may have established grazing rights on the mountain and other parties may have lost same. This is obviously a matter of evidence and the Circuit or High Court has jurisdiction in the matter. The area is further complicated in that grazing rights invariably attach to appurtenant lowland and from our experience the court orders obtained by claimants are based on the common law principles of ‘Levancy and Couchancy’. In simple terms this means that the right to graze is based upon the ability of a person’s lowland to sustain the sheep for the winter period.
I would also like to bring to the attention of the Deputy the efforts made by my Department to find a resolution to this dispute. In particular, I wish to refer to the number of meetings organised by my Department at which efforts were made to resolve the dispute and allow payments to issue. In addition, officers of my Department have spent much time over many years in discussions with the parties involved. However, no resolution could be achieved despite the efforts made by my Department to secure a settlement. I acknowledge that this is a complex legal dispute that has proved impossible to resolve since the introduction of the Single Payment Scheme and has clearly evoked strong feelings amongst those involved.
I would strongly urge all of the parties directly involved with this commonage and their representatives to come together and seek a resolution to this matter. Their cooperation and agreement is the only way in which this matter can be resolved. My Department continues to be available to facilitate the reaching of such an agreement. It will, in the context of the end of the Single Payment Scheme this year and its replacement by the Basic Payment Scheme in 2015, re-examine all the issues involved.
