EU Petitions Committee Urges Halt On Tara Work

Insists Europe's Common Heritage Must Be Protected

The European Parliament's Petitions Committee has called on the Government to halt work on part of the new M3 motorway after concerns was raised regarding the impact on newly discovered 2000-year old ruins found at Lismullin.

According to the letter, work on that section of the project should be halted and a route review carried out.

The committee's decision came after it had received a number of protest letters about the motorway route from Irish environmentalists.

The drive to halt work on the contentious motorway was helped at the last meeting of the Petitions Committee, when Kathy Sinnott, MEP, requested that Tara be added to the agenda because of material changes in the situation at Tara since their last fact-finding visit in June.

At the end of June the EU Commission sent a final warning to Minister Gormley instructing him that the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) on the M3 motorway project was invalid and that the National Monuments Act was out of line with Europe's EIA Directive.

The National Monuments Act had been used to allow road construction to continue without a new EIA after the discovery and classification of a major archaeological site at Lismullen.

Ms Sinnott said that the letter "clearly shows how seriously the Tara issue has become in the EU. As Vice President of the Petitions Committee I have been in a position to highlight the issue and have received enormous support for the preservation of the Archaeologically important Tara-Skryne valley especially in light of the findings at Lismullen.

"I demand that the government cease all works on this section of the M3 motorway until the EU's pending legal action against Ireland is resolved.

"I also urge Minister Gormley, who I know has a great personal concern for Ireland's heritage to make that concern public and join me and the Petitions Committee in forcing the Government to suspend all works around Tara until the legal issues are resolved.

"It is completely unacceptable for the government to continue to push through the works and destroy this site so that it will be too late once the case is heard in the Autumn to save Tara.

"This government must be prevented from destroying an important part of our heritage."