ICMSA call on ministers to intervene on planning exemption for slurry storage

ICMSA deputy president Eamon Carroll called on both the minister of agriculture and minister for housing to make a concerted effort at getting the promised planning exemption for slurry storage “over the line and into law”.  

He was speaking following a meeting of the Agriculture Water Quality Committee.

Mr Carroll said the original timeframe for the implementation of the exemption was the beginning of 2025, but farmers were hearing now “to their panic and irritation that the exemption could be delayed to Q4 of this year”.

It’s a delay that Mr Carroll contrasted very starkly with the “do this immediately deadline and timeframes that officials habitually adopted when they were imposing changes on farmers”.

“It’s very difficult not to notice the difference in tempo and urgency that we see when it comes to the State making a change that benefits farmers – as opposed to making a change that increases the burden on farmers,” said Mr Carroll.

He said when the State wants something from farmers it’s happening in a fortnight or in a month or two, or we have a fixed schedule that won’t be changed. 

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“When it comes to introducing a change that will benefit farmers - like the planning exemption for increased slurry storage – then suddenly it becomes ‘shur we’ll try and do it by the end of this year’ – and we’re hearing this after only six weeks of 2025.

“Farmers put slurry storage construction on hold for the opening of the new TAMS 3 grant, that TAMS has been delivered but the planning exemption was meant to go hand-in-hand with that opening of TAMS 3 is not on the horizon and ‘might be’ at the end of the year, so effectively a whole year will have been lost. 

“It’s not good enough; we know of many farmers who considered expanding slurry storage but delayed waiting for the exemption from planning permission – that’s a whole year wasted. We have to get this over the line.”