It is fundamentally changing and needs to go further.

Part of that change will be a change to Coillte. It needs to change. It has done a brilliant job but it was legislated for in the late 1980s when the emphasis and focus was on privatisation and commercial lumber production. That has changed. Coillte's mandate will be changed. It is already changing towards a closer-to-nature model. We recognise that what has been done with forestry, while it delivered acres and lumber, did not deliver better biodiversity or a better nature solution in our country. Coillte too is pa…

In my mind, the central part of our new forestation system is where the State and farmers, primarily, as well as private developers, will be involved in delivering new, more natural, more resilient forests.

That is what we will deliver.

It was launched two months ago.

The reason that programme, which was only launched a matter of weeks ago, is going to work is that there has been a huge increase in premiums, particularly for farmers, who are getting a 20-year premium as opposed to a 15-year premium for others. The grants cover the cost of plantation, tax free.

The premium comes every year, tax free. The sale of the lumber at the end of that goes to the owner tax free.

That is going to lead to a massive expansion.

It is happening. You would want your head examined to not start investing in forestry under the programme that has been put in place.

The truth, from my perspective as Minister with responsibility for climate, is that we will not only need 8,000 ha per annum but a multiple of that.

The critical question, to go back to the matter of quality not just quantity, is that of where. We made a mistake in the first stage of the evolution of forestry in the State where it was on the marginal lands on peaty soils in uplands areas where we drained the soils and released carbon. It is now going to have to come down and will have to be integrated. Many farmers will plant and continue farming but they also have a forestry stream within the farm.

This is happening.

This was launched weeks ago. Mark my words, because it is so generous in regard to the changed premiums, it will take off-----

-----as well as Coillte and other private operators being involved in afforestation.

The Gresham deal is not the future of Irish forestry.

It cannot be. The future has to be more diverse, better for water quality and better for nature as well as providing -----

Nearly a year ago, Vladimir Putin sent his tanks into Kyiv and set the world ablaze by putting energy prices through the roof. They had already risen because he had been turning off the tap deliberately in advance and using energy as a weapon of war. The inflation that resulted and the cost-of-living crisis that came from that was unprecedented, probably since the early 1970s and the oil-price crisis. Any independent economic analysis of any credit or note would assess that this Government's response in the last ye…

That is the job of the Central Bank.

The Central Bank is the regulator.

We set the broad policy context around not having consumers ripped off but that is the mandate of the Central Bank. There are 2,000 people there with real expertise in the area and a clear mandate from Government to say we do not want anyone exploiting or getting an undue profit or an unduly high interest rate. That is their job. If we started to become the regulator again, where would that end? That got us into a lot of trouble in the past where people thought the political system could do the job of the Central B…