Avril Doyle
Ceist:9 Mrs. Doyle asked the Minister for the Environment whether he considers the expertise of the Geological Survey of Ireland essential in the initial selection of landfill sites.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Landfill Site Selection.
Standing advice to local authorities on landfill site selection includes a document prepared by the Geological Survey of Ireland incorporating geotechnical guidelines on waste landfill site selection. Local authorities regularly seek advice on landfill issues from the GSI or from private hydrogeological consultants.
The Environmental Protection Agency will have a statutory role in determining criteria and procedure for landfill site selection, management, operation and termination, and in supervising relevant monitoring by local authorities.
My question asks specifically whether the Minister considers the expertise of the Geological Survey of Ireland essential in the initial selection of the landfill site. I know local authorities and others often approach the GSI, generally for drawings and maps only, often at the environmental impact assessment stage. I am asking if the Minister considers it essential in the initial selection of the site? I am assuming he would. Why, then, did Dublin County Council not get the advice of the GSI in relation to the dump at Kill in Kildare?
The matter appertaining to Dublin County Council is surely separate.
The Geological Survey of Ireland is unquestionably the leading public sector body of expertise in geotechnical issues. Hydrogeological expertise in the private sector has increased considerably in recent times. There is, of course, in-house expertise in local authorities' engineering staff who may have special qualifications on ground water issues. Thus, there is a plethora of expertise from which the local authority has a choice to base its judgment in these matters. The GSI has prepared the base document for local authorities on which they make judgments on landfill sites. That base document has been used for some time. There is therefore no question but that the expertise of the GSI is available to local authorities. The expertise is not necessarily essential if private expertise is available to a local authority. It is a matter of local autonomy, something that the Deputy has often spoken in favour of. The power to make decisions in matters such as this is vested in the local representatives on the local council. It is up to them to decide what is best for them in given circumstances. It is not a matter for the Minister.
They cannot build houses without money to build them.
Houses are still being built.
I respectfully ask the Minister to answer my specific question. This is an area of major concern. The GSI has for many years been to the forefront as this country's leading expert in the selection of landfill sites for waste disposal. That is an indisputable fact, and I do not think that the Minister is disputing it now. Why, then, in the initial selection of the Kill site did Dublin County Council not ask the GSI to visit the site and give advice on suitability before the council handed over £1 million of taxpayers' money to Roadstone for a gravel workings, without even a requirement for planning permission?
I am sorry, I do not wish——
Surely the GSI should have been asked to give an opinion on the initial suitability of the site, and, from there on, Dublin County Council could have proceeded to approach Kildare County Council for planning permission.
I do not wish to disadvantage the Deputy in any way, but the matters she is raising about Dublin and the dump at Kill are separate issues. I would welcome specific questions on those subjects.
The matter raised by the Deputy is in the first instance entirely a matter for the local council and the local elected members. It is up to them to take the best decisions they can reach in a given case. I am not in a position to make reference, one way or the other, to the issue concerned. It is a matter primarily for the planning process, which is an independent process and which will remain so.
It is now a matter for the local authorities between them, since the Minister amended SI 25 of 1990 by SI 209 of 1992, having had his fingers burnt locally by the issue of the Slievenamon dump in his own county. I know that it is now a matter for the councils. In the context of a waste management policy for Ireland, would the Minister consider the inclusion of a condition that in the initial selection by local authorities of all landfill sites benefit is gained from use of the expertise and advice of the GSI? That would avoid a repetition of the fiasco that is being witnessed in relation to the proposals for the dump at Kill. Could the Minister at least give a guarantee that in future the GSI will be asked to help in the initial selection of landfill sites?
That is quite an amount of repetition.
First and foremost, I did not get my fingers burnt in my own county on any matter, including the dump to which Deputy Doyle refers.
The Minister changed the legislation hotfoot after the incident.
In my quasi-judicial functions in relation to these matters, I decided that——
It was time.
——the dump should not proceed.
But the Minister did not——
I would hope that Deputy Theresa Ahearn——
I agree with the Minister——
The Minister should deal with the question before the House.
I hope that Deputy Ahearn has not been advising Deputy Doyle to raise these matters in this way and that she supports the decision I took.
We had to wait until the local elections.
The Minister came to a decision as quickly as possible, with the ballot box looming.
We fought a long battle.
That brings me to the question of SI 25 of 1990 and the amendment, SI 209 of 1992. It was clear that there was a flaw in the regulations. In circumstances in which the local authority——
Perhaps it was too hot for the Minister to handle.
In circumstances in which the local authority is carrying out operations in its non-functional area it is required to obtain planning permission.
Yes.
In the normal way, if an environmental impact statement was required, the local authority would go through that process. The 1990 regulations required a local authority going through the planning process separately, with an environmental impact statement, to approach the Minister in that regard, who also had to obtain an environmental impact statement. To make sure that the procedure was more efficient, and mirrored the system followed by the private sector, I decided to amend the regulations, in spite of all of the opposition.
What is the Minister's view on the Kill dump site?
Did the Deputy not hear my answer?
As I have previously said, that issue is worthy of a separate question. The progress of questions today has been particularly sluggish. The House has dealt with some nine questions in 65 minutes. Such progress is extremely unsatisfactory. Let us try to expedite matters. Let us now deal with Question No. 10, in the name of Deputy John Connor.
Thank you, a Cheann Comhairle, for your comments. As you will realise, it is not possible for a Minister to do other than try to answer the questions asked.
I accept that, Minister. I was in no way trying to inhibit Ministers. I have no control over Ministers' replies and, seemingly, I have very little control over Deputies' supplementary questions.