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Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Thursday, 9 Nov 2017

Vol. 961 No. 3

Heritage Bill 2016 [Seanad]: Second Stage (Resumed)

Question again proposed: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."

Deputy Catherine Connolly was in possession. Some of the balance of her time will be taken by Deputy Mick Wallace.

I think I have 12 minutes.

Yes, or less if the Deputy wishes.

I will probably take it all.

In many ways it is strange to call this Bill a Heritage Bill. It seems to me to facilitate the eradication and destruction of certain elements of Irish heritage. There are a number of parts to the Bill, including provisions on canals and the burning of vegetation on uncultivated land, as well as changes to the laws protecting National Parks and Wildlife Service rangers. I will focus for the most part on the issue of hedgerows.

There are no positive actions for wildlife in section 7 and section 8 of the Bill. BirdWatch Ireland argues that several red-listed birds, including the curlew and yellowhammer, would be severely negatively impacted by the proposed changes in the Bill. In Ireland, the curlew has experienced an 80% decline since the 1970s and is threatened with extinction globally. The yellowhammer population in Ireland has collapsed. Burning in March will destroy curlew occupied nesting territories and those of other upland birds. The yellowhammer is a red-listed bird due to a staggering 90% decline in breeding population as part of an 11-year to 14-year trend. The yellowhammer uses hedgerows for nesting and was once a common enough sight on telephone wires in rural Wexford. One would do very well to spot one these days in Wexford or anywhere else in the country. According to BirdWatch Ireland, 5% of yellowhammer nests are still active at the end of August. Active means the nests still contain unfledged young. The changes proposed in the Bill will contribute to increasing the already massive contraction in the yellowhammer population in Ireland.

The Bill flies in the face of the all-Ireland pollinator plan. This is at a time when one third of all Irish bee species are threatened with extinction. Bees pollinate many of our crops, such as oilseed rape, apples, peas, beans, strawberries and raspberries. In a 2013 journal article, Dr. Dara Stanley from the National University of Galway and Dr. Jane Stout of the school of natural sciences at Trinity College Dublin stated that the value of insect pollination of crops to the Irish economy is estimated to be €53 million per year. The World Wildlife Fund 2016 report says that changes in the timing of life-cycle events in nature mean that hundreds of plant and animal species are beginning to respond to an earlier spring. We know that since 1970, the number of wild animals on the planet has dropped by more than half and by 2020 it is expected to drop by two-thirds. We have animals and birds changing and expanding the structure and timings of their life-cycles, due to global warming. The more vibrant periods of wildlife activity are encroaching further into non-traditional times of the year and the Government is proposing not to acknowledge this development, but to double down and make the timeframe in which we are liable to destroy them even longer.

No scientific rationale has been proposed for the changes proposed in the Bill. For example, burning has limited value as a land management tool. The changes are proposed as a two-year pilot programme covering all 26 counties. Not only is this poor legislation, but it is also poor in terms of scientific methodology. What is the proposed control area for the experiment? If all of the 26 counties will serve as the experimental group, then what does the Bill propose to use as the control group to which the experimental group might be compared? How on earth will this so-called pilot period and its success or otherwise be monitored? The National Parks and Wildlife Service is already chronically under-resourced and so far no extra resources have been promised.

Fianna Fáil got an amendment to the Bill when it was going through the Seanad which would exclude internal hedgerow cutting in August. Fianna Fáil, the Green Party, Independents, Sinn Féin and Labour were all against section 7 and section 8 of the Bill in the Seanad. I hope their positions will be the same here. It is important to acknowledge that tillage farmers have concerns about the cutting of internal hedgerows, as opposed to road-facing hedgerows, specifically those tillage farmers who grow winter barley. It was mentioned during one of the Seanad debates on the Bill that farmers who grow winter barley account for 4% of the farming community. If this figure is accurate, then perhaps a special provision might be made for these particular farmers. Of course, this should be balanced with the need to maintain biodiversity.

The Bill also appears to pose problems with Ireland's EU greening payments for farmers. It may very well weaken the case for funding for farmers in the green low-carbon agri-environment scheme, GLAS, as part of the Common Agricultural Policy.

Regarding burning on the uplands and lowland hills, as Oonagh Duggan of BirdWatch Ireland in a recent Oireachtas Report interview argued, we need a strategy for upland management with hill farmers at its core, farming with nature in mind. Many of our upland birds are red-listed for conservation concern. They are on their way out, as is hill farming. We need to think creatively about how we can support and care for both environmental farming and the environment itself. However, the law on illegal burning must be enforced.

Using freedom of information requests, the Irish Wildlife Trust found that 57 wildfires took place across the country this year. Almost all took place in March and April, the period when burning is illegal. Over half the wild fires were in designated areas of conservation, including two national parks, Killarney National Park and the Wicklow Mountains National Park. According to freedom of information requests, however, the Irish Wildlife Trust found no one has lost out on a single farm payment and no farmer was penalised in 2016 under cross-compliance rules. I stand to be corrected if I am wrong on this last point.

Road safety is at the heart of the argument for the need to amend the Wildlife Act with this Bill. Vegetation impinges on road safety. Obviously, it is important and necessary to improve visibility on roads and reduce hazards. Road safety should be the most important issue. If I might presume to speak on behalf of BirdWatch Ireland, the Federation of Irish Beekeepers, the Irish Wildlife Trust and others who briefed Members recently, neither I nor any of these groups is ignoring road safety.

If a hedge needs to be cut to make a road safe, the hedgerows on that particular road should be cut at any time of the year. However, there is absolutely no reason hedgerow cutting should be taking place in the so-called "closed period". If hedgerows are properly managed throughout the year, this simply would not be necessary. At the recent briefing organised by Senator Alice-Mary Higgins, this was made absolutely clear in response to questions raised by Deputy Danny Healy-Rae. Nobody should argue roads should remain unsafe. However, that does not mean that road safety concerns should not, or cannot, be balanced with concerns with biodiversity.

Hedgerow cutting needs to be done according to best practice. It needs to be regulated and there needs to be accountability. The Heritage Bill is dependent on voluntary action. It will not compel landowners to cut the necessary overgrowth that is actually causing road safety problems. The proposed changes permit, but do not compel, landowners to cut hedges during August. This means that the main road safety issue, namely, landowners who fail to comply with their obligations under section 70 of the Roads Act, is not addressed. The biggest problem with the excessive growth of roadside vegetation is not landowners who want to cut hedges and cannot. Rather, the issue is with those landowners who should cut their hedges and do not do so. The proposed changes in this Bill do nothing to address this problem.

Another problem is that road safety issues during August, according to the provisions of section 8, would be self-defined by landowners. The aim of section 7(2) is to allow regulated cutting in August. This would in fact be nullified or invalidated by section 8. Instead of the Road Safety Authority defining road safety, it will now be the landowners who decide with no regulation and no answerability to the Minister. This would make a mockery of the very idea and purpose of cutting seasons.

My constituency, Wexford, has been a national leader in promoting biodiversity in terms of hedgerows through its Life Lives on the Edge programme. The aim of this project is to maintain roadside vegetation at various pilot sites in the county. The aim is to achieve biodiversity without neglecting road safety or infrastructural maintenance objectives. Wexford is a biodiversity model for the rest of country. The project co-ordinator in Wexford County Council, Niamh Lennon, deserves special praise for her work in developing the project. The rest of the country can learn much from the success of this Wexford project.

I call Deputy Thomas Byrne. Is he sharing time?

I do not propose to.

That is a matter for the Deputies. I do not want to get involved.

It is not necessary because there is no guillotine.

I am just asking the question.

It is no disrespect to my colleague.

I do not get involved in internal party affairs. I am totally impartial.

I am just saying we will all get time.

I have been waiting some time to speak on the Heritage Bill. The idea this Bill, in particular section 7, is about road safety is a complete and utter fraud. If it were to do with road safety, the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport would be putting it before the House, advised by the National Transport Authority and Road Safety Authority. That has not happened in this case. Instead, the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, who is meant to be protecting our heritage and rural affairs, disgracefully is using the guise of road safety to put a provision like this forward in the House.

The provisions put forward originally in the Seanad would have allowed hedge-cutting in August at a time when many birds are still using hedgerows to nest. The yellowhammer, which has a strong presence in County Meath, needs to be protected because it is endangered and still breeds in hedgerows during August. However, this Bill was brought in under the guise of road safety. We all put road safety first but there is no road safety issue in this case. We already have a Roads Act which allows for the cutting edges for the sake of road safety. There is no reason to change the law on the grounds of road safety.

On the first day of law school, one is told if a measure has to be changed, it is because there was a mischief or something was wrong with it. There is nothing wrong with the existing regulations in terms of road safety. Local authorities have full power and control to decide whether there is an issue of road safety that requires hedges to be cut. This Bill, as originally put forward in the Seanad, added nothing to that. It simply allows certain vested interests - these vested interests were very few because no farmer I asked was looking for this provision - to take over legislation and use road safety in a fraudulent way to essentially give free rein to hedge-cutting in August.

There was significant debate and ill feeling towards this legislation in the Seanad. There was also much debate in my party. I pay tribute to my colleague, Deputy Ó Cuív, who steered the debate in our party and nationally with the various interest groups lobbying on this. His proposal is welcome in that he wants to have a pre-legislative scrutiny hearing on Committee Stage where all interested groups can thrash through sections 7 and 8 to understand exactly what is involved and where we and the Department should go on this.

The Bill was originally introduced as a fraudulent measure with the claim road safety reasons required it. The fraud continued and got worse. After much debate in the Seanad, an amendment was fraudulently stuck in at the last minute of Report Stage which purported to deal with concerns raised in the Seanad. I understand that in the middle of the night, section 7 was amended and representations were given that this would resolve the issue that a large majority of Senators had raised. It has completely liberalised what was already an attempt at liberalisation of the position. I would love for the Minister to contradict me and tell I am wrong on section 7. I will be listening carefully to her reply on this.

As I see it, the new section 7 essentially removes the local authority as an arbiter of whether a road safety issue exists and makes the process self-regulatory. That is the fraud. That is certainly the legal advice others have received and it was certainly my reading of it when I read it originally. I was horrified when I read it. However, I am willing to listen to the Minister about this. I meet the IFA regularly. They are all really good people who contribute massively to this country's economy. Never once did this issue come up in all of my meetings with the IFA over many years. It was never brought to my attention that there was an issue with regard to hedges in August or any other time of the year or that there was a particular road safety concern that had to be addressed at any other time of the year. This was never brought up with me. Had it been brought up by the IFA, I would have considered it and looked at the issues, as I do with any legislation. I would have examined whether it was necessary before forming a view, but it was never raised with me. Rather than having the local authority be responsible for things under road traffic legislation, the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, utterly fraudulently in my view, is allowing the local authority to be taken out of the picture and for a self-regulatory regime to be put in place. If I am wrong on that, I will be delighted to be told that I am wrong and I will listen to and accept that, but I want all the interested parties to be listened to and their concerns addressed on Committee Stage in order that we get legislation that is necessary to protect our heritage, wildlife, farmers and road safety, if that is the agenda. If we are looking at protecting road safety in this legislation, I would rather it came from the Road Safety Authority and the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport. That is where it should come from.

I am not making the case that road safety should be of lesser importance. It should be of huge importance. I am not making the case that we should make life difficult for our farmers. We should make life as easy as possible for them. However, we had legislation relating to a closed season for years that was accepted by everybody and there were no issues. I said that nobody ever lobbied me about it, and if they want to lobby me that the closed season needs to be opened, let them come and make the case to me, but someone made the case to somebody in the Department over recent years. I do not really know who. Certainly when I rang one or two farmers, they said this might help, but for the ones to whom I spoke, it was a relatively marginal issue and was not the most important thing. I do not see how what is envisaged can be supported because we really have a crisis. The Minister has responsibility for and is in charge of protecting our natural heritage. That is her role in terms of this legislation, and we are doing a bad job of protecting our natural heritage. The number of curlews is dropping dramatically. The number of cuckoos has dropped dramatically. I doubt the Minister hears it but she might hear the cuckoo in parts of her constituency, particularly the eastern side and possibly the west of Cavan. The reason the number of cuckoos is falling is that nests are not available for cuckoos because the number of those birds is declining as well.

We have a huge issue in this country. In my experience, farmers are the biggest supporters and are the most understanding and knowledgeable about biodiversity and species, but the understanding, expertise and sympathy for our natural heritage farmers and organisations like BirdWatch Ireland, which I very much support, have along with all these groups and people living in rural Ireland are not demonstrated by the Department and Minister in any way, shape or form. This legislation has been changed significantly. It has been shown that there are substantial concerns and opposition but there is also substantial willingness for everyone to work together for the common objectives. Yes, we all want road safety. Everybody on every side of this debate has said that. Everybody wants to protect our biodiversity and natural heritage. Everybody wants to make sure our farmers have the best possible shot at producing the crops we need to feed ourselves and that farmers need to pursue farming, so everybody agrees on those broad principles. What Deputy Ó Cuív is proposing, which is that everybody gets together on Committee Stage to see how we all work together to see how best to deal with all of these issues, is really important.

I will be totally honest. Burning is not an issue to which I have given huge consideration personally. It does not happen too much around where I live but there were some high-profile cases this year that caused angst. They were illegal fires that caused people who live in the area and people all over the country angst, not just because of the inconvenience and the massive road safety concerns caused by large-scale burning during the legal closed season but also because the people worry about biodiversity. Deputy Fitzmaurice spoke very interestingly last night. Yes, he was standing up for rural Ireland. We all want to stand up for rural Ireland and we do so. I represent a constituency that is half rural and half urban, so I see both sides of the story. However, Deputy Fitzmaurice seemed to think that this was a case of NGOs - do-gooders, as he called them - trying to interfere with the way rural Ireland has always worked. Yet in all of what was essentially claptrap from Deputy Fitzmaurice, there was a golden nugget where he said that everybody should get together about burning and that local groups should be established to see how burning could be done safely to protect our biodiversity. As I understand it, this is very similar to what BirdWatch Ireland has been saying so I think there is a huge opportunity for voices as apparently diverse as those of Deputy Fitzmaurice and the NGOs in the biodiversity sector to come together to work out the best possible solution to this matter.

I do not normally speak so passionately about many of these issues but I am passionate about protecting our biodiversity and I believe I represent a substantial portion of the population of this country, both rural and urban, to which the Minister should listen. This is something we believe in and value, something we see we are losing, and something we must protect and must urge the Government to protect. There is huge potential on Committee Stage to work this out together. I do not believe the amendment thrown in at the last minute in the Seanad was that but, as I urge the Minister to do, I am willing to listen and accept the exact legal position when that is through.

I know the European Commission has been notified about requirements for the habitats directive and the birds directive. They are serious issues that have been brought up by serious people and of which the Minister must have due cognisance. It is hard to believe how an amendment brought in on Report Stage relating to the new section 7 could have been analysed for compliance with European law. There is no possible way it could have been analysed to the exact level of detail required to make it compliant with the birds directive and the habitats directive. It is really important that it is compliant because we do not want this country to be subject to fines. We do not want hassle forever more after the Minister leaves office because someone did not dot an i or cross a t or because we did not all work together in this House with the NGOs, the IFA and even the contractors' association, which seems to have a strong interest in it, along with the Road Safety Authority and the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport. Everybody should get together and try to work out a common solution to this. That is what Deputy Ó Cuív is proposing, which is something I very much value. Deputy Ó Cuív has steered a very moderate course on this Bill. There are many different voices here, but in response to Deputy Fitzmaurice, there are things that everybody is saying and it is up to us in this Parliament to distil them and work out a common approach in order that we can come up with something everyone can support and that can protect farmers, road safety, our really important biodiversity and the natural heritage for which the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht is responsible.

If Deputy Breathnach is ready and has enough time, I will share the remainder of my time with him.

Fianna Fáil supports the main objective of this Bill. I endorse what Deputy Thomas Byrne said about bringing together the various interest groups as the Bill progresses.

I compliment the many custodians of our countryside, including environmental groups such as BirdWatch Ireland, An Taisce, the Irish Wildlife Trust or the Hedge Laying Association of Ireland, together with many environmental enthusiasts such as the 880 Tidy Towns groups which manage the issue of biodiversity in many of our towns and villages. I especially compliment those in the agriculture sector who have for generations endeavoured to achieve a balance between food production and wildlife protection coupled with more recent and ever-growing problems associated with road safety.

There is no doubt that the increase of vehicular traffic in our countryside, larger vehicular widths and the population growth, which has created an upsurge in walking, cycling and participation in rural pursuits, have added to the vexatious issue of when it is appropriate to trim roadside hedges. Added to all of this is the issue of climate change, which is beginning to change the traditional seasons of growth. That, along with additional heat and moisture, has seen unprecedented growth of roadside verges and hedgerows.

Many views are being obstructed, and the onus of liability seems to fall increasingly on those in the agricultural sector to ensure that their property is not the cause of litigation. In addition as a result of Storm Ophelia and previous storms, there has been a call to denude our roadsides of the trees that are just as important as our hedgerows. Many of us are aware that for a person owning land on either side of a public road, effectively the roadway is part of the landowner’s portfolio and inevitably will give rise to litigation in time to come. Equally a person owning only one side owns to the centre of the road.

The Heritage Bill is about getting a balance between road safety and wildlife protection. Anyone with roadside frontage is very aware of achieving this balance. I compliment those in the agriculture sector who have been the real custodians of our wildlife for generations.

The hedgerows along many of our rural roads need trimming back beyond what the current legislation allows. All we need to do is talk to those who jog, cycle or walk on these roads, not to mention those who drive trucks. Reference has already been made to the damage being done to protruding mirrors. In getting that balance right we need to protect the interests of human life without compromising the wildlife living in those hedgerows. The 187 tragic road fatalities in 2016 represented a 15% increase on the previous year, which speaks to issues relating to protection of our hedgerows. It is about getting the balance between wildlife protection and the safety of those who use our roads.

Regarding road safety concerns, most farmers who avail of schemes such as GLAS will employ environmental planners in order to effect that plan. I have had personal experience with both the previous REP scheme and the current GLAS where in the development of the plan, the planner indicated from a road safety point of view the need for hedgerows to be trimmed outside the season, and that was then accepted by the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine. While people have talked about the local authorities having responsibility for the roadsides, the reality is that most local authorities do not cut any hedges except at junctions and ultimately those in the agricultural community get hedge-cutting notices. It is trying to get a balance between that road safety issue and wildlife.

Without over-complicating the system of EU grant aid, there is a method there in order for the whole issue to be legalised without necessarily interfering with our wildlife to any degree. We all have to survive and food production is equally important. The bees and the birds obviously help with growth and propagation. For the agricultural sector to survive, that balance can be achieved.

I welcome that the Bill provides for a review in two years. The best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry. If people do not subscribe to the balance that I support, it can always be reviewed.

Sinn Féin opposes the Bill for many reasons. Obviously, we are all very conscious of having to protect our environment and wildlife, and of road safety. I grew up in a rural area and am very much aware of those aspects.

I am very concerned over the decline in the bird population. One figure suggests that our bird population has declined by a quarter over a number of years. Much of that is down to irresponsible work carried out by some farmers, in particular the uncontrolled burning on hills and mountains. Many of my age group will remember in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s welcoming spring with the arrival of the cuckoo. I have not heard a cuckoo for years and many other people living in rural areas would have a similar experience. Deputy Tóibín, who is beside me, says he has never heard a cuckoo, which is down to the lack of management and lack of control of our hedges, ditches and so forth.

An aspect of it goes back to what was called progressive farming - removing ditches and hedges to make huge fields for convenience to accommodate the type of machinery that is used nowadays. The cost we have paid has been the decline in a number of species of birds and the effect it has on wildlife. It has not all been progressive; it has had that effect. Travelling along motorways, one will see areas with one field that previously had four fields, and the associated protection for the wildlife is gone.

Frequent cutting has also done damage to bees owing to the decline in the flowers they need to produce honey. Fewer flowers result in fewer bees.

I was very impressed by Deputy Ó Cuív's contribution on consultation and having focus groups sit down to decide on how to move forward. The consultation between the Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht and the EU comprised just one informal meeting, which is inexcusable. We need many more meetings to ensure we have the necessary type of consultation.

It would be good if all the lobby groups came together to argue out their case. We all want to protect our wildlife, to ensure that our roads are safe and that needs to be done in a responsible way.

I do not accept that the powers are not there for local authorities and others to deal with areas which are a danger to the public, irrespective of the time of year. They have the legal authority to do it. That should certainly not be an argument against it.

Sinn Féin will be voting against the Bill but we want to offer constructive criticism. It is not just about scoring points. Collectively, all of us here want to do the right thing. We want to protect our birds and wildlife and ensure that our roads are safe. We want to ensure we keep our countryside as it should be for future generations. That is the role we will play in taking a position today. Consultation is needed and people must be listened to. Many arguments are made every day in the House on the decline of rural Ireland, usually with reference to the declining population and the lack of jobs. Our environment is equally important.

The question was raised earlier as to whether this is heritage legislation at all. Many aspects of the Bill are not sufficiently cognisant of what many environmental NGOs and farming community voices have said, namely that there is no need for sections 7 and 8. There is no huge cry or lobbying effort calling on the Minister to look at this area and introduce these provisions. As such, I hope the Minister will be open to some of the suggestions we put forward this morning. I will consider two aspects of the Bill, namely Waterways Ireland and canals and sections 7 and 8 on burning and cutting of hedgerows and moors.

Every organisation needs legislation to facilitate its activities and to ensure compliance with the law, in this case on the use of public waterways. However, the Bill proposes to change fundamentally the way people use our canals and waterways. I have looked at the system Waterways Ireland currently operates. On the Barrow navigation, the Grand Canal and the Royal Canal, five days' mooring is available under the combined mooring and passage permit, but opportunities also exist to take up to 12 months' mooring vacancies on serviced and unserviced moorings. Waterways Ireland operates an extended mooring permit at a cost of €152 which allows 12 months' mooring at a single designated location and this is available at more than 60 locations on the Grand Canal, Barrow navigation and Royal Canal. Most extended moorings are on soft banks without services but there are also serviced moorings available on the Barrow navigation, Grand Canal and Royal Canal. After 12 months, however, one must reapply for a permit. There is no permanent permit. Nevertheless, a lot of people live on barges because it is a way of life, cheaper and services can be accessed on the docks.

I have been approached by a number of boat and barge residents from the Grand Canal who are hugely concerned about the by-laws the Bill proposes to introduce and the tremendous powers it proposes to grant to authorised officers to challenge people in these areas. I have referred to the €152 payment, but there is also a €126 payment to moor in these areas. Residents have been told they could have to pay up to €5,000 for a permanent permit on the Grand Canal. One of the people who approached me is a pensioner on the State contributory pension. If he were in a local authority house or apartment, he would be paying €30 per week in rent, or approximately €1,500 a year. If the Bill is enacted, there will be lots of regulations on follow-up, authorised officers' powers, by-laws, enforcement, fixed payment notices, search warrants, service of directions, and prosecutions, but I see nothing about how much the long-term permits people are hoping to get will cost. We need to step back and discuss with the people the moorings and Waterways Ireland how this should be progressed, just as people have said we should proceed in relation to hedgerows, uplands and burning and cutting. This is a way of life for these people just as buying a house and moving into a home is for someone like me. Everything around the mooring is part of their way of life. The Minister should be very careful because these people feel they are being evicted from their permanent residences, albeit they have to renew their permits annually at the moment. I ask the Minister to take cognisance of that and to avoid making it prohibitive for these people to stay on the canals. I ask her to assist these people and to consider grants to allow them to upgrade their boats and ensure they are canal or water worthy. She must work with them. I will put down amendments in this regard on Committee Stage.

Sections 7 and 8 are the two main sections people have raised. Under section 40 of the Wildlife Acts, vegetation on uncultivated land and any vegetation growing in any hedge or ditch is protected during the period March to August, inclusive. The Bill proposes to change section 40 to permit under regulation the cutting of vegetation grown in any hedge or ditch on the roadside during August and the burning of vegetation in March. It also exempts landowners from section 40 in any cutting undertaken pursuant to section 70 of the Roads Act. A coalition of environmental NGOs, which the Minister knows well, has gathered 30,000 signatures from citizens who are concerned that the proposed changes will have a negative impact on already threatened wildlife. In general, there is no scientific basis for the proposed changes, which is very important and must be taken on board. The proposed changes impact on Ireland's commitment under European regulations but have not been formally discussed with the EU as far as I am aware. They also place additional pressure on already threatened species. There has been no assessment by the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport of the implications of the Bill for road safety. The two year pilot period covers all 26 counties but no methodology for the study has been provided. No baseline data have been recorded despite the lapse of two years during the passage of the Bill through the Oireachtas. The National Parks and Wildlife Service is already underresourced but no additional resources have been promised.

I turn to section 7(1). Burning in March destroys occupied nesting territories. Even if the birds have not yet laid eggs, breeding may not take place that year if an established area is destroyed in this way. Burning has limited value as a land management tool and other management strategies, including grazing, should be deployed to improve upland farm areas. Agricultural policy should reflect the value of scrub and upland habitats for biodiversity, stock management and shelter and not seek to have such areas made ineligible for agricultural payments. Cutting hedgerows from March to August impinges on the biodiversity value of hedgerows. The changes proposed in section 8 are for the convenience of land managers and are not aimed at strengthening wildlife protection. Section 8 will result in the reduced oversight of biodiversity protections. There are provisions in existing legislation to address road safety. The proposed changes permit, but do not compel, landowners to cut hedges. The main road safety issue relates to landowners who fail to comply with their obligations under section 70 of the Roads Act but this is not addressed.

The Bill is internally inconsistent. The purpose of section 7(2) to permit regulated cutting in August is nullified by section 8 which permits year-round, self-definition of road safety issues by landowners with no regulation or ministerial oversight. That leaves section 40 of the Wildlife Act unenforceable having regard to hedge cutting and hedge removal. Hedge cutting is currently restricted during the period 1 March to 31 August annually. The National Roads Authority can cut during the closed period for health and safety purposes and it is the authority that defines road safety issues during that closed period.

The roads authority is answerable to the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht for work undertaken during the closed period for health and safety purposes. There is a discrepancy between the provision of section 70(2) of the Roads Act and section 40 as regards landowners as there is currently some legal uncertainty as to whether a landowner who is served a section 70 notice by the roads authority during the closed period is exempt from the Wildlife Act. In reality, the NPWS is very unlikely to consider a prosecution where a section 70 notice exists.

As regards section 7(2) of the Bill, landowners can cut roadside hedges under regulation by the Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht during August for a two year period renewable by Oireachtas resolution. Roadside cutting is not limited to safety issues by primary legislation. No draft regulations have been published and road safety issues during August would be self-defined by landowners.

Section 8 exempts landowners from section 40 of the Wildlife Act for road safety purposes. Road safety issues year round are now self-defined by landowners who are subject to no regulation and have no answerability to the Minister. That is not consistent with the intention of section 7(2) and effectively leaves section 40 of the Wildlife Act unenforceable as regards hedge cutting. The section amends the principal Act and is not subject to the two year pilot period. The Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht does not have authority in matters of health and safety in respect of roads. There are no Government guidelines for landowners on assessing and dealing with road safety issues caused by structures on their land.

As regards burning and environmental impacts, annual wildfires have severely damaged upland habitats across Ireland such that the National Parks and Wildlife Service has assessed them all as being in bad condition. The decline in hill farming has coincided with a decline in wildlife and habitats. Many upland bird species are locally extinct and listed on BirdWatch Ireland's red list of birds of high conservation concern. Such birds include the red grouse, nightjar, twite, ring ouzel and golden eagle. A study carried out by the University of Leeds in the UK found that controlled burning resulted in the loss of biodiversity, water pollution, soil degradation and increased carbon emissions. Effects from annual wildfires are likely to be much worse. Controlled burning does not happen in Ireland. A freedom of information request by the Irish Wildlife Trust, IWT, found that controlled burning happened in one location in 2016. Data gathered by the IWT in 2015 and 2016 show that approximately 50% of all wildfires take place in areas designated for nature conservation. Failure to protect these areas risks sanction from the European Commission. Existing enforcement measures are not effective in preventing wildfires. A freedom of information request by the IWT found that in 2016 no farmer was penalised under cross-compliance rules despite extensive and widespread wildfires that year. It is to be hoped that no farmer consciously started a wildfire.

Our hills are valuable for more than just the food produced therefrom. They are also important landscapes for recreation and amenity, protect water quality, help prevent flooding, store carbon and are home to unique wildlife. Rewarding farmers for all of these services and not only one as is currently the case holds the key to protecting our environment and the livelihoods which depend upon it. Restoring peatlands will help us reach our commitments under climate change agreements, restore habitats for endangered wildlife and protect water for downstream use, including alleviating floods. A new uplands strategy which brings together complementary interests and which can propose tailored solutions to suit each area is urgently needed.

Those points were submitted by BirdWatch Ireland and Neil Foulkes of the Hedge Laying Association of Ireland and I wanted to read them into the Dáil record. It is important that we put that on the agenda because I do not believe that farmers are anti-biodiversity. They want to be part of that diversity and be able to support it in every way they can.

As regards climate change, all Members know that bees are integral to our climate. If the bees go, we go. There have already been problems in Ireland in respect of a loss of bees of different varieties. There have been recent attempts to reintroduce bees into the environment. I wish to read into the record a letter from Jane Sellers and Loretta Neary of Dunlavin in County Wicklow, who are very involved in beekeeping:

When you deliberate on the Heritage Bill please be aware of the following facts: honey bees and other pollinators are entirely reliant on flowers for their food, which is pollen and nectar; in many parts of Ireland hedgerows and scrub are the only sources of flowering plants and habitat; to cut, grub or burn flowering vegetation at any time of the year is to deprive pollinating insects of food; to cut hedges or verges in August is to destroy a food source vital to bees as they gather pollen and nectar to store for winter; to grub and burn flowering vegetation in March is to destroy a food source vital to bees as they emerge from winter; important hedgerow and verge/ditch species that flower in August include blackberry, rosebay, ivy, meadowsweet, gorse. Important species of scrub that flower in March include gorse, willow, hazel and alder.

Arguments are mounting that we have to take a step back from the Bill as it stands and revaluate it along with those interested groups and those affected by the Bill such as NGOs, the IFA, the Road Safety Authority and the Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht. As a nation, we must ensure our roads are safe and that our farming community can work with biodiversity and make a living out of it and also ensure our biodiversity is kept up to scratch. Question marks have been raised about EU payments and the European habitat and birds directive and I would be interested to find out more about that. There would be a case taken to the European court if the Bill is passed in its current form. I would like there to be a step back from this. I will be opposing the Bill and calling for a vote on its progression to the next Stage. We should work together to ensure that any changes to canals and our heritage have to be taken on board by everybody and ensure no one is prohibited from pursuing their way of life.

I thank the Minister for bringing forward the Bill. There are certain aspects of it on which I would like further clarity but it is a move in the right direction and one we should have made long ago. That would have avoided a hell of a lot of issues we are dealing with today, including people being killed on roadsides by falling trees, as well as the problem of illegal burning that is not being properly controlled. The Bill goes some way toward tackling those issues, although it needs further clarity which will hopefully be delivered in the coming days.

As regards verge cutting, rural Ireland, and in particular a huge percentage of the area I represent in Cork South-West, is in a state of disarray in respect of overgrowth on roadsides. I put forward a motion to Cork County Council approximately two and a half years ago while I was a councillor that it would carry out a survey on overgrown trees on the roadside in west Cork. I am sad to say that survey never took place. We were lucky not to have experienced more damage about a month ago when there was a severe storm because everything I said at that time came true. We have a lot to commend the ESB for because if it was not for the ESB cables and poles holding up trees in west Cork there would have been a severe loss of life. We were lucky to have a very good radio station that warned people to stay inside. There were trees flying down onto roadsides left, right and centre during the storm, which had gusts of 191 km/h.

People, and Deputies in particular, in urban Ireland do not have a clue what is going on in rural Ireland. They go on about birds and bees but do not understand that the farmers of west Cork and Ireland protect our birds and bees to the best of our ability. Common sense has to come into play. It has not been in play in respect of verge cutting for many years. My worry is that verge cutting will be extended to August on a trial basis.

There should be no trial basis. It is common sense to cut verges and I will prove it to the Minister. Fair play to Cork County Council - I give praise where praise is due - it has come up with a great verge cutting scheme in west Cork. It is a fabulous scheme, under which local communities can apply for funding to cut verges. In my proud community council area of Goleen every single community applied for a grant. Every community saw a need to do so as simply roads were closed. I received a call from a holiday maker in Goleen in July who asked: "In the name of God, what is wrong? I cannot go up my road. It is closed from both sides." Common sense should have been applied. There should have been no need to ring the local authority or fill in forms. Verges should be cut and clean and tidy. If they had been, there would have been no need for that gentleman to worry. Unfortunately, because of the system in place, we could not go near them and it was disappointing for me to have to tell him.

When grant application forms were put on the table, every community council, all of which have a lot of environmental protection thoughts on their minds, jumped at the opportunity because they knew that it was a necessity to apply. Communities in areas such as Lowertown, Toormore, Rathoora, Goleen and Cloghankilleen to Mizen Head and Crookhaven, as well as Caher, Letter and Arduslough applied for grant aid and thankfully received it. They are now cutting verges which should not be cut at all in November or December. They should have been cut two or three months ago when we had to protect the tourism industry. We have people renting cars who will not get back their deposit because cars are being torn asunder in visiting beautiful parts of the world. It is absolutely farcical.

This is a move in the right direction, but it should not be done on a trial basis. It should be simple and solid. We should cut verges because lives will be lost if they are not cut. It should come from the top in Dáil Éireann that every local authority should carry out a survey of trees growing along the roadside. There should be strict regulations such that every tree would be cut before people's lives were lost and they are being lost. People are worrying about the bringing forward of a drink-driving Bill, but there is no such worry about those who are being killed or nearly killed or seriously injured by trees. Far more people are going to be hurt than as a result of the carry on with the drink-driving Bill.

I will move on to another issue on which I seek clarity. It is the issue of burning. I am a farmer and met officials of the Department of Agriculture, Food and the Marine in Portlaoise before I came a Deputy. I told them that they would be the cause of an inferno and they were. They fined farmers for having gorse on their farms. They fined them a sum of €5,000 and made the fines retrospective by four or five years. They are terrorising farmers. What can they do? They cannot leave the gorse or burn it because it is wet. There is no proper burning season. I am in discussions with the ICSA and the IFA to see if can we come up with some procedure as we cannot work within the system in place. Basically, farmers are being forced out of business. They will be fined out of business by the Department if they do not get rid of the gorse and they cannot burn it because there is no burning season.

We are lucky that Muintir na Tíre and Mr. Diarmuid Cronin are arranging for controlled burning. I hope that in the next few weeks all stakeholders will be around the table or rather on the ground and that there will be controlled burning, which I would welcome. However, the season must be extended. If it is, there will be legal burning. We must also stop blaming farmers. In 99% of cases, they are not to blame. In some cases, their land is being burned unbeknownst to them or the fire is spreading over the ditch from some other person's land. In a lot of cases, there is messing at the side of the road at night time. People get a thrill out of seeing the property of others burning.

It is fine to talk about burning; it sounds beautiful for those living in an urban area who look out and see the Luas and beautiful taxis. They will not have to worry about briars, bushes and trees. I am sorry, but we do. We are realists. I welcome the movement being made to provide for burning and verge cutting, but we need to go further. We need clarity. It is not good enough that it is being done on a trial basis. It has to be embedded in concrete. I welcome many aspects of the Bill and appreciate that the Minister is doing her best to adopt a common-sense approach.

I thank all of the Deputies who have participated in the debate. I congratulate Deputy Catherine Martin who spoke last night on her election as chairperson of the women's caucus.

I stress that the amendments to the Canals Act are primarily enabling provisions to allow Waterways Ireland to make by-laws to regulate boating on canals and manage their use. They were developed on the basis of legal advice to ensure the by-laws would be legally robust. The draft by-laws will be subject to public consultation for a period of up to 90 days and any person can submit objections to them. Waterways Ireland shall consider the objections and the consent of the Minister will have to be obtained for the by-laws which will be subject to review every five years and laid before the Houses of the Oireachtas.

This legislation and the by-laws that will emanate from it will enhance the ability of Waterways Ireland to manage the Royal Canal, the Grand Canal and the Barrow Navigation for the benefit of all of their users. Last night, Deputy Niamh Smyth referred to the Ulster Canal. It is a priority for me and I am delighted that work has been well progressed on the first section of the canal, from Belturbet to Castle Saunderson where the bridge is almost complete. I am glad to see that the work is continuing apace.

Regarding hedge cutting and burning, a number of Deputies referred to the provisions in section 7 of the Bill. Deputies will be aware that an amendment was passed in Seanad Éireann to restrict the cutting of hedges in August to roadsides only. It is proposed to harmonise section 8 of the Bill with the provisions of the Roads Act on the cutting of hedgerows for road safety purposes. As I have stated, there is a conflict between the Roads Act and the Wildlife Act. The divergence of law between the two makes no sense. We must avoid confusion and inconsistency in order that the courts can interpret the law and deal with breaches of it. The provision included in section 8 has been designed to harmonise the two items of legislation, clear up any confusion and remove conflict.

Deputy Thomas Byrne has been misinformed. This is a complex issue, but I will try to explain it. We have the Roads Act, for which the Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport is responsible. Under that Act, the owner or occupier of land shall take all reasonable steps to ensure a tree, shrub, hedge or other vegetation is not a hazard or potential hazard to persons using a public road and that it will not obstruct or interfere with the safe use or maintenance of a public road. He or she, therefore, is meant to take reasonable steps. On the other hand, the Wildlife Act states very clearly that a person cannot interfere with the hedges in the period referred to. The Minister for Transport, Tourism and Sport cannot amend the Wildlife Act which is the Act which prohibits hedge cutting along the roadside. It is my responsibility to amend it. Landowners were always permitted and even obliged under the Roads Act to cut hedges for the purposes of road safety. It is not correct for the Deputy to suggest there is somehow fraud involved in bringing the Wildlife Act into line with the Roads Act. That is unjustified.

This legislation is not about the widespread and heavy cutting of hedges. It will simply allow a person to trim a hedge in the month of August in certain instances only. In that regard, any trimming of hedges in August may only be of the current season's growth and may only be carried out along the roadside. This affects only a small percentage of the overall number of hedgerows in the country. If heavier cutting is required such as grubbing or flailing, it must be carried out during the current permitted period of September to the end of February.

They can continue to do so during the existing permitted period which runs from September to the end of February. This is a two-year pilot project. My Department will carry out studies to determine what effects, if any, emerge during this pilot phase. The expert advice of officials in the National Parks and Wildlife Service, NPWS, however, is that hedge-trimming of this nature in August is unlikely to have much of a direct impact because of the scale involved. This will be a managed and measured regime and will be subject to clear guidelines. It will strike an appropriate balance between protecting our wildlife and allowing for common-sense trimming of hedges in certain instances only.

There has been a lot of misinformation and scaremongering about this Bill. This Bill will not make it compulsory for anybody to cut a hedge in August. If a hedge is blocking the view of road users, however, the landowner will now be able to trim back that hedge in August. This is a serious issue on local byroads in rural Ireland where hedges are growing out on the roads, damaging cars and restricting the views of motorists. There is of course a provision whereby local authorities can cut hedges in the interests of road safety but the reality is that local authorities simply do not have the manpower or the resources to be out on every byroad in the country inspecting and trimming hedges. Anybody living in rural Ireland will be aware of this. We cannot have a situation where cars are damaged and accidents caused because drivers cannot see around corners due to overgrown hedges. The proposal in the Heritage Bill 2016 represents a moderate and common-sense solution to address this problem.

The curlew was mentioned. I have established a special curlew task force to examine what steps can be taken to support the native curlew, something that has been warmly welcomed by groups such as Birdwatch Ireland. Like many Deputies in this House, I too am from rural Ireland and I respect our farming community and its contribution to the local economy in rural areas. Our farmers are the custodians of our countryside and any suggestion that they are indifferent to our natural heritage and wildlife is complete nonsense. Farmers are not seeking to cause harm or damage. All they want is the flexibility to carry out their own work in a manner that also respects our biodiversity. Deputy Breathnach is right when he says that we need to strike a balance and that is what this Bill does.

With regard to the burning provisions, I echo the Deputies who condemned the spate of illegal burning in certain parts of the country during the spring and summer periods. There is a misconception, however, that this Bill will allow for the extension of the burning season into March and therefore allow all landowners to burn vegetation on any day during the month. I want to make it clear that the provision is not a blanket approval to allow indiscriminate burning of vegetation in March. This legislation, rather, will allow me to make regulations to allow burning in certain areas of the country, in a particular county or parts of a county, at specified periods in the month of March. I want to work with landowners in this respect. This Bill does not allow for widespread burning of vegetation. I also point out that in both Britain and in Northern Ireland the burning of vegetation is allowed up until the middle of April. What I am proposing, then, could not be considered an indiscriminate or unreasonable measure. The forthcoming regulations and best practice guidelines will provide guidance to landowners on a number of issues, including rotational burning; that species and habitat consideration should be to the fore in planned burning; and the need to liaise with relevant authorities and local fire service personnel. What is proposed here is, in essence, the potential extension by a maximum of four weeks to the period during which controlled and responsible burning may be carried out. This will be limited to particular areas and subject to statutory regulation. Such controlled land management activities in March have nothing at all to do with the kind of burning incidents we witnessed during the summer.

I note the contributions made by some Members on the impact of the burning and hedge-cutting provisions on bird life, especially on the nesting period for various species. I want to assure Members that the regulations that will be drafted to give effect to these provisions will take account of the nesting period as well as of our obligations under EU nature directives. Deputies Fitzmaurice and Michael Collins pointed out that we all depend on the people of rural Ireland to preserve our countryside and I agree with them on this. Like many other rural Deputies, we were reared in rural Ireland to respect our countryside and to look after it.

With regard to the Heritage Council, I stress that the changes mainly relate to governance procedures and have arisen as the result of a detailed review undertaken in 2012. I agree with Deputy O'Dowd that the Heritage Council and its local heritage officers have done great work in engaging with local communities and indeed, through the schools programme, with young people in order to encourage them to connect with and preserve our heritage.

Historic towns were also mentioned. In 2014, we ran a very successful pilot programme in three historic towns - Westport, Youghal and Listowel - in partnership with the Heritage Council and Fáilte Ireland. Beginning in 2018, we hope to roll this out to more towns in the coming years. I consider this very important.

I look forward to further constructive discussion and debate on the next Stage. Go raibh maith agaibh.

Question put.

In accordance with Standing Order 70(2), the division is postponed until the weekly division time today.

Sitting suspended at 11.15 a.m. and resumed at 12 noon.
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