Walkers no longer get the failte, Greens claim

The Republic has changed from the land of "céad míle fáilte to the land of céad míle f-offs", when dealing with walkers, the Green Party has claimed.

Its tourism spokesman, Mr Paul Gogarty, said that walking, a vital element of the tourism sector, was being allowed to die because nobody was prepared to make the "tough decisions".

Mr Gogarty was introducing a Private Members' Bill, the Planning and Development Amendment Bill, which would make the listing of rights-of-way a mandatory part of county development plans.

But the Minister for the Environment, Mr Roche, said that while the Bill's objective was positive, "its effect would be bureaucratic and would do little for the real objective of promoting greater access to the countryside". He also said that it would be prejudicial to the dialogue currently being facilitated by Comhairle na Tuaithe between all the parties involved in the issues associated with public rights-of-way.

The Minister for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs, Mr Ó Cuív, described the legislation as "using a sledgehammer to crack a nut". Legislation should be considered "only when a consensus has been arrived at, not as a partisan solution to a problem.

"I want to make one thing absolutely clear. Where there are public rights-of-way, there are public rights-of-way and nobody can take them away. If no public right-of-way exists, putting it in a county plan will not make it a right-of-way of itself."

Mr Gogarty said that rural and farming communities were being denied valuable incomes because of bad leadership and a lack of balance at local and national level. In 1993 about 320,000 overseas walkers came to the Republic, but this was reduced by 100,000 in 2002 and last year there were 50,000 fewer walkers.

"In a time when the rest of the tourism sector is holding up, why should we be haemorrhaging walking tourists. The anecdotal and factual evidence is quite simply this. When it comes to walkers, Ireland has changed from the land of céad míle fáilte to the land of céad míle f-offs.

"It's only a minority of angry, frustrated and sometimes downright ignorant landowners who give us a really bad name, but it's enough to do our tourist industry untold damage."

Mr Ó Cuív said that "we must never again have a situation where people using advertised and agreed walkways are then accosted".