Richard O'Donoghue: Hedges, Wildlife and Human Safety
Richard O'Donoghue speaks on the tension between biodiversity measures and road safety in rural Ireland, urging government action on hedge management to protect both wildlife and people. He argues that current rules leave roads overgrown, risking motorists, schoolchildren and delivery drivers, and calls for coordinated, practical hedge-cutting.
Road safety and biodiversity at odds
Richard O'Donoghue highlights incidents on rural roads where overgrown hedges force vehicles into the middle of the road, damaging mirrors and endangering drivers, bus passengers and pedestrians. He frames the problem as a governance failure: biodiversity protections are necessary but must be implemented alongside road-safety measures.
A practical proposal for hedge management
The speaker proposes a once-off, properly timed hedge cut and ongoing maintenance to create clear sightlines and safe road margins. He says such an approach would protect both nature and human life, preventing collisions and preserving wildlife habitat when done correctly.
Accountability and policy implications
O'Donoghue calls on the government to join up thinking across departments so nature restoration does not come at the expense of public safety. He stresses that protecting biodiversity and protecting people are compatible goals if regulations and maintenance regimes are aligned.
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Minister, biodiversity, nature restoration, but there's nothing about here protection of human life. And when I talk about, I'm from a farming background, I live in rural Ireland, but when I talk about people trying to get safely to school and the bus network or trucks trying to get through with goods from the farmers heading to the shops, when I talk about people trying to get to work, and when I talk about people trying to walk the roads, and when you see all the roads in Ireland now closing in, and they talk about protection of wildlife, which pulls the mirrors off of trucks, buses, cars, puts people in endangerment, when they haven't come up with a solution about wildlife off the sides of the roads, and a safe passage for humans on the roads. But it's not only a safe passage for people on the roads, it's also saving nature. But no, they ignore this and say oh my god, we must let all the roads in Ireland close in, and put people's lives at risk. I love wildlife, and I want to protect wildlife. But I also love humans, and I want to protect human life. But there's no joint up thinking when it comes to governance. You can only cut the hedges at certain times of the year. If they cut the hedges properly once, and all the systems one metre up and straight up, you protect everyone. You protect wildlife, you protect human life. But they don't seem to look at it this way. So how many people in this country are driving around roads, and when they come around the bend of a road, they're met with a vehicle in the middle of the road, because they can't keep into the side of the road, because of everything growing out on the road. All by policies, by governance, rather than joint up thinking, and allow the hedges to be cut back properly once, and then maintain them from there on out, which protects wildlife, which protects human life. But it looks like human life comes last when it comes to this government. So I'm asking this government, please, we want to protect nature, we want biodiversity, but we also want to protect human life. Might be something that they might actually think about.
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