Officials in the Irish Farmers’ Association, Ireland’s largest farmer representative group, continue to go against the ‘Greenway Code’, which the organisation signed up to.
The Code of Best Practice on greenways outlines how CPOs must be kept part of the process even where most or all landowners voluntarily agree to the sale of land, but the Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA) said this week that it is “opposed to any… compulsory purchase orders (CPOs) for amenity projects like Greenways.”
The Code of Best Practice for National and Regional Greenways was created by farming and Government bodies due to complaints about using farmland for greenways.
It was published in December 2021, months after the High Court rejected cases against the An Bord Pleanála planning permission and the accompanying CPOs for the 27km Kerry Greenway from Glenbeigh to Caherciveen.
Soon after the Code was agreed, the Supreme Court also disallowed two appeals against the South Kerry Greenway. The High Court judgement, which was upheld, dismissed arguments that CPOs cannot be used on “amenity” projects.
The High Court Judge, Richard Humphreys, said: “The applicants quibble with the reference to community need, but that is only a recognition of the reality and a legitimate consideration. Necessity for compulsory acquisition does not require absolute necessity.”
“It requires a determination that the acquisition is desirable or expedient having regard to public benefits such as the creation of public infrastructure and meeting community need. That involves a judgement as to public benefit and does not require some sort of artificially high threshold like a finding that the existing infrastructure is dangerous,” Judge Humphreys said.
The Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA), the Irish Creamery and Milk Suppliers’ Association (ICMSA) and the Irish Cattle and Sheep Farmers Association (ICSA) all signed up to the Code of Best Practice, including what is seen widely as generous payments to land owners which are separate from the land acquisition compensation.
The Code includes payments starting at €6,750 for landowners who have 1 to 100 metres of land where the greenway is being routed through and up to €22,500+ for 550+ metres distance along a landowner’s property.
These payments are over and above the normal land acquisition payments.
The Code outlines how CPOs are a key part of the process even when landowners are selling the land to a local or national authority using Voluntary Land Acquisition Agreements.
The Greenway Code outlines that: “The [planning] application to ABP [An Bord Pleanála] for development consent will include approval for the entirety of the lands for national and regional Greenway projects which will be included in a Compulsory Purchase Order (CPO).”
“This will ensure that the scheme can proceed in the absence of Voluntary Agreement for all individual plots or if there are title difficulties which cannot be resolved by an individual landowner,” it explained.
According to the code: “The availability of the CPO would allow the acquiring authority and the landowner to proceed and resolve title difficulties where Agreement has been reached with an individual landowner, for example, if a third party asserted some rights over the landowner’s holding or where probate has not been concluded.”
It added: “The project promoter would then be able to extinguish that third party right and obtain clean title. This provision will benefit both the landowner and the project promoter by enabling title issues to be resolved and allow land payments to be made.”
However, this week, an IFA press release objected to the use of CPOs on the West Cork and Cork to Kinsale greenways.
The press release said: “IFA Munster Regional Chair Conor O’Leary said the IFA also made it clear to the Council that IFA is opposed to any severance of farms or compulsory purchase orders (CPOs) for amenity projects like Greenways.”
This is not the first time since signing the Code that the IFA has gone against a core part of the Code.
Six months after IFA signed up to the agreement in May 2022, when talking about the Dublin to Galway Greenway, another regional executive rejected the use of CPOs.
Roy O’Brien, the IFA’s regional executive for the Galway and Mayo area, told the Connacht Tribune that: “The mention of compulsory purchase orders or splitting farmland in two is like a red rag to a bull. It simply won’t be tolerated. Remember, this is not about compensation.”
The Galway Greenway statement apparently wasn’t in a press release, but two other press releases were issued in addition to the one last week.
In a November 2023 press release on the Sligo Leitrim Greenway, it was outlined that Sligo IFA chair Michael O’Dowd and Leitrim IFA chair Liam Gilligan are both against the use of CPOs for greenways.
The press release said: “The IFA Sligo and Leitrim County Chairs made it very clear to the project promoters that IFA is opposed to any severance of farms or compulsory purchase orders (CPOs) for amenity projects like Greenways.”
Then, in July 2024, another press release, this time covering the Carlingford-Dundalk Greenway, quoted Louth IFA chair Kevin Sweeney: “The IFA is opposed to severance of farms or compulsory purchase orders (CPOs) for amenity projects like Greenways.”
The press releases combined have attracted widespread coverage from local and national media outlets with no references to the IFA going against the agreement it signed up to.