Results 41-60 of 1,036,735 for in 'Dáil debates' OR in 'Committee meetings' (speaker:Ciarán Cuffe OR speaker:Marc Ó Cathasaigh OR speaker:Richard Bruton OR speaker:Chris Andrews OR speaker:Mark Ward)

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: We are not far down the line. We have announced an intention to have an external review. Is that right?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: Do we have a timeline?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: That is for the tendering process, which will take a certain amount of time. Surely the terms of reference includes a reporting time.

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: We are hearing on this issue that the Department will do a root and branch review, that there is urgency and all the rest. However, in response to another "RTÉ Investigates" programme from a full year ago, I am told the Department has looked at a terms of reference and is thinking about bringing something to tender. It does not speak of urgency. When we saw the conditions those dogs...

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: I just want the headline figure. Sorry to interrupt.

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: What are we spending on biosecurity controls?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: The biosecurity controls, especially on the importation of plastics.

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: The €237 million is more or less a quarter of a billion euro. I am looking at this from the perspective of fire blight, which is here. We have an issue. It took us too long with ash dieback. We should have been much stricter. I do not know whether we could have prevented it crossing the Irish Sea with weather conditions. That point is moot, but fire blight is a real and present...

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: We have biosecurity as an island though. We can control the plant and animal species that are coming in.

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: Will Mr. Gleeson revert to us with a quantum of funding?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: The old Joe Biden line is, "Show me the budget and I will be able to tell whether you care about it or not."

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: The Chair has covered most of the ground but I want to pick up on the vaccination programme, particularly insofar as it relates to badgers. It sounds very much like we are going in the right direction. I am delighted to hear that and that our practice is underpinned by research that indicates vaccination is no less effective than culling. If you cull a badger, you create movement within...

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: I was going to ask about the flip side, namely the deer-management strategy. Maybe the officials will have the figures dug out afterwards. Am I correct that we have not implemented the deer management strategy yet and are still formulating it?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: Although "straightforward" may not be the word I would use to describe the management of a deer population, a deer population is managed through culling in an Irish context because the deer have no predators. Is it the Department of agriculture which is responsible for issuing licences for deer hunters? Where does that lie?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: Does the Department of agriculture speak to the NPWS? Surely that will be a central plank of our deer management strategy.

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: Would Mr. Gleeson be aware of the number of deer culled? Has the Department spoken to the NPWS to get its hands on those figures?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: Is there any differentiation between sika and red deer in that the red deer are native and sika are non-native. Would I be right in saying that the sika are much more problematic in terms of moving across landscape?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: Let us say there is no specific instruction to the people who would be involved in deer culling to cull one but not the other.

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: Could we return to that wildlife element if Mr Blake has had the opportunity to pull the figures out?

Public Accounts Committee: 2022 Annual Report of the Comptroller and Auditor General and Appropriation Accounts
Vote 30 - Agriculture, Food and the Marine (11 Jul 2024)

Marc Ó Cathasaigh: It is still less than one eighth of the compensation programme. It represents very good value for money if we can prevent paying out a compensation programme by investing more in our vaccination programme. That seems to me to represent good value for money.