A bill which seeks to protect “significant hedgerows” across the country for their environmental benefits has been introduced to the Dáil by Green Party TDs today (Wednesday, May 22).
Provisions of the Protection of Hedgerows Bill 2024 prohibit the removal of “significant hedgerows”, except where permission is granted or in “other limited circumstances”, Deputy Marc Ó Cathasaigh said introducing the bill.
A “significant hedgerow” will be identified by reference to its contribution to the protection, maintenance and improvement of biodiversity; ecosystem services; the integrity of archeological, historical heritage or cultural sites or features; and agricultural systems.
Hedgerows act as wildlife corridors, nesting sites for birds, are home to “countless” insect species, slow the flow of water to help protect the landscape against flooding, and play an “important role” in sequestering carbon, he said.
“However, our legal protection of this important feature of a landscape is currently sorely deficient – an issue that this bill seeks to address.
“In Ireland a landowner can remove 500m of hedgerows without required screening, provided that the same length of hedgerows are planted elsewhere beforehand,” Deputy Ó Cathasaigh said.
The purpose of the bill provides for the following:
- The protection of “significant hedgerows”;
- The establishment of a register of “significant hedgerows”:
- Prohibit the removal of “significant hedgerows” except in specified circumstances;
- Provision for an appeals procedure and offences for infringement;
- Provision for a notification mechanism to local authorities regarding potential or actual infringements of this act.
The bill also includes the term “potentially significant hedgerows” which, he said, is indented to cater for “any uncertainty” a landowner may have as to whether a particular hedgerow falls in the category of “significant”.
Hedgerows bill
The bill sets out the power of the minister to set out the regulations for the factors to be considered in relation to measuring the environmental contribution of a hedgerow. This process will be administered by the local authorities, he said.
The bill also outlines enforcement provisions and penalties which, according to the deputy, “broadly align” with those in place for offences under the Wildlife Act and the Forestry Act.
He added that the bill also allows a court to impose a “remedial payment” on a person convicted of an offence of removing a “significant hedgerow” where this “adversely affects” the ecosystem of a local area by reducing the sequestration or storage of atmospheric carbon.
The Protection of Hedgerows Bill 2024, which is co-signed by Green Party TDs Brian Leddin and Steven Matthews, was drafted by the Hedgerows Legislation Project, which is a working group of Comhshaol – The Climate Bar Association.
Food prices
Another bill introduced today is the Grocery Price Caps Bill 2024 by People Before Profit-Solidarity TD Paul Murphy, who said food costs are a “massive issue for hundreds of thousands” of families across the country.
Deputy Murphy said food poverty is “getting worse”, citing a “huge escalation” in the cost of food and a 20% increase in food prices in the last three years.
The Grocery Price Caps Bill 2024 would set up a grocery prices caps commission made up of consumer and employee representatives, particularly low-paid workers and vulnerable groups, he said.
The commission would decide which foods should be subject to price caps and what those should be, taking into account different foods in average diets, the increase in prices in the past three years and profits in the grocery production sectors.
“This time last year, the government was going to tell the supermarket bosses ‘cut grocery prices or else the government will use consumer protection law to impose grocery price caps’.
“But a year later, grocery prices are still going up, supermarket profits are still going up, but the government has done absolutely nothing to address them. This is why I am introducing this bill,” according to Deputy Murphy.
A decline in inflation levels does not mean that prices are going down, he said and stressed that a lower rate of inflation means prices are “not rising as quickly” as they were before.
“In some cases, the price of staple goods Irish families rely on to feed their children are actually still rapidly rising,” Deputy Murphy told the Dáil today.
The price of potatoes rose by 17% in the last year, while prices of rice and frozen vegetables were up by almost to 11%, he said citing figures by the Central Statistics Office (CSO).
“This comes on top of earlier double-digit increases in the price of milk, eggs, butter, pasta and white sliced pan,” according to the People Before Profit-Solidarity TD.