Historic and Archaeological Heritage Bill 2023: Committee Stage
Seanad Éireann — 2023-03-01
============================================================

Victor Boyhan (IND), Agricultural Panel

I can think of six or seven of these historic monuments in my own locality within five minutes of my house. No one seems to be taking responsibility unless somebody rings up and complains. The OPW sometimes steps in. The local authority does it. It is not obliged to do it and it might not have any status, but it does it because it is in the heart of a community. It is an area that we may need to look at another time. Let us not waste too much time. However, there is a concern around these monuments where, shall we say, there is no great certainty. Historically, someone cleans them and maintains them, but that does not necessarily mean they are the owner. Sometimes the local authorities do not know of their responsibilities either. I just want to flag that to the Minister of State.

---

Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted.

Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2023-03-01/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:51:38+00:00
Sitting date: 2023-03-01