I move:—
That the Dáil agree with the Seanad in amendment 6:—
Section 40, sub-section (1). After the word "interruption" in line 42 the words "or objection made" inserted.
The section, as Deputies will understand, is for the benefit of persons who have been peacefully exercising grazing rights. As the law exists, these rights are confirmed, if they are enjoyed for a period of twenty years. Until this Bill is passed that law will remain. Such rights must have been openly, peacefully and continuously enjoyed, according to the existing law. Under this section such rights are confirmed after eight years user on the date of the passing of the 1923 Act. Hitherto, according to the existing law, these rights would not be confirmed until the user had proved he had been undisturbed in peaceful possession for twenty years. During this period the owner of the land may not have been able for several reasons to interrupt the user as he would be undoubtedly entitled to do. The word "interruption," in the sense in which it is used in this section, means stopping a person from using a right. There are cases in which the owner may not have been able to stop parties exercising a grazing or a turbary right. He may have been away and, for one reason or another, he may not be able to stop the exercise of particular rights. He may, perhaps, have attempted to take legal proceedings. Except for this particular section he would have twelve years more in which to take legal proceedings; that period represents the difference between the eight years and the twenty years.
It is only fair that if formal objection were made the rights should not be claimed. When it was originally introduced the section was not intended to benefit, and certainly should not benefit, persons who seized grazing or turbary rights by force and kept out those who really had rights there. That has happened in many parts of the country. In my experience of Land Commission administration during the last three years I have come across many cases where one tenant has seized a grazing or a turbary easement which undoubtedly was the right of an adjoining tenant, and which it was the intention of the landlord that the adjoining tenant should enjoy. It is not only the landlord who would suffer damage by such unlawful trespass. In regard to mountain grazing and bogs, there are several tenants who have bona fide rights of grazing and turbary, and these rights will possibly be infringed by this section. They should be protected as far as possible from the claims of unlawful and, perhaps, violent trespassers.
This amendment will undoubtedly help tenants just as much as it will help the owners. There are many cases throughout the country where certain tenants are exercising rights of grazing and turbary to which they really are not entitled, and the landlord never intended these particular tenants should have these grazing or turbary easements. It will, for that reason, give the Land Commission an opportunity of setting right these cases. I may say that these difficulties are numerous in many parts of the country. The words "objection made" are introduced for this end only. They do not mean a person objecting merely because of dislike; he must make a formal objection; he must take some definite open step to stop the user before he will be held to have made an objection. It will be for the courts to determine whether any such steps have or have not been taken. The amendment is a reasonable one, and, in a sense, it is more in the interests of the tenants than of the owners, and I ask the Dáil to accept it.