News
17th September 09
9/17/2009
Ulster Unionist MLA Tom Elliott has expressed concerns that the Forestry Bill will endow the Forest Service with too much power, while failing to offer adequate protection for ancient woodland.
Ulster Unionist MLA Tom Elliott has expressed concerns that the Forestry Bill will endow the Forest Service with too much power, while failing to offer adequate protection for ancient woodland.
"Having been brought to the Assembly this week, this Bill has given rise to significant reservations, particularly as regards commercial forestry. The power it will give to the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development and the Forest Service is simply too great, and comes with no meaningful checks and balances," the Fermanagh and South Tyrone MLA said.
"Handing regulatory powers and compulsory purchasing powers to an agency that also owns and operates a near monopoly of publicly owned forestry doesn’t seem entirely reasonable
I am hugely concerned about the overall control that the Bill will give to the Forest Service and the Department, because the Forest Service is involved in the commercial production of timber, and it should not have an advantage over private industry. I believe that the Bill will give the Forest Service a huge advantage - a case of being both poacher and gamekeeper perhaps?
"The compulsory acquisition of land puts the Forest Service at a huge advantage over private industry. It allows it to take land off any farmer or landowner that it so desires for its own purposes. That would give the Forest Service wide-ranging powers, and, unless there is a good reason for it to acquire land, such powers are not acceptable. That particular clause should be narrowed to mean the compulsory acquisition only for reasons of access to land, and if that were the situation, that power should also be available to private landowners.
"However, to my mind this isn’t the only troublesome element of the Bill, as there are issues over its environmental emphasis. It doesn’t place a strict enough duty on the Forest Service to protect native and ancient woodland and biodiversity and to manage forests in a sustainable manner.
"Concerns have also been raised with regard powers the Department will potentially give to the Forest Service to cull any animal on forestry land and adjoining land which poses a threat to the forest, giving exemption from wildlife protection, hunting and other legislation. These are issues which must be addressed in detail.
"While I am broadly supportive of the Bill’s efforts to protect and enhance woodland, I am concerned that it fails to adequately balance competing demands."
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