DOE 'disappointed' by lack of Causeway progress

Northern Ireland Environment Minister Dermot Nesbitt has said the inability of groups interested in developing the Giant’s Causeway as a world-class heritage site is a source of frustration and disappointment to him.

Speaking today at the draft Management Plan for the future of the Giant’s Causeway Mr Nesbitt said he wanted to see a 21st century visitor’s centre established but that continued fraught relationships among the key people seeking to deliver it, represented an “obstacle to progress”.

To date the Moyle District Council, the National Trust and several private developers have been caught in a wrangle over who should fund and oversee development of the site.

Mr Nesbitt said: “I am greatly disappointed that our only World Heritage Site does not yet have a world-class 21st Century Visitor Centre. DOE is currently considering a planning application from a private sector developer for a Visitor Centre. For some time now, Moyle District Council has also been exploring the possibility of bringing forward a proposal of its own. For my part, I pledge myself to give all applications that are brought to me the most particular and sensitive consideration.

“In parallel, Moyle Council has very recently proposed that DOE should acquire the Council’s landholding. As the Council recognises, this proposition raises many complex legal, policy and financial issues. While I will examine the proposal carefully, I would not be happy for instance, for taxpayers to foot the bill for a Visitor’s Centre that others have said they would pay for.”

Mr Nesbitt also said he would not be in favour of drawing a 4km exclusion zone around the Causeway site, as advocated by UNESCO, United Nations cultural preservation group.

Mr Nesbitt said: “I think a moratorium of this kind would have very real adverse impacts on Bushmills and Portballintrae, both of which fall within the 4 km radius of the World Heritage Site. Paradoxically, it might also delay the early development of a world-class 21st Century Visitor Centre that we all want to see.

“There is also a real risk that it would be successfully challenged in the Courts. These factors led me to the conclusion that such a moratorium would be counterproductive and would not add materially to the protections already in place.

“However, in view of the concern expressed by UNESCO, I have invited representatives of the World Heritage Centre to visit the site and to meet all the interested parties. My Department will co-ordinate and host that visit, and I hope that it can take place soon.”

(AMcE)