According to Minister for the Environment Carole Dieschbourg, the case of a crèche in Beckerich, which had their construction work discontinued by the Ministry of the Environment on 25 June, was not treated differently than any other.
The minister made these statements in an answer to a parliamentary question by ADR MP Fernand Kartheiser.
Tageblatt was the first newspaper to report on this case with Luxemburger Wort following suit shortly afterwards. The case sparked particular interest because of Barbara Agostino, owner of the building as well as member of the Democratic Party (DP) and married to Green Party MEP Tilly Metz. The author of the report in Luxemburger Wort questioned why the Nature and Forest Administration was so quick to be on site shortly after the construction work was discontinued. She also wondered why the latter wrote the ecological balance and why the building owner did not have to hire an external company.
Kartheiser shared the concerns raised in the article and asked for a number of specifications in his parliamentary question. The ADR MP also tried to make a connection to a previous scandal involving the former mayor of Differdange. The latter led to a number of opposition MPs accusing Dieschbourg of favourably treating her fellow party member.
However, the minister disputes the claims made against her. She stated the area in question was in fact a biotope within the development plan. While construction work can take place there, the ecological balance was necessary in order to determine how the nature that would be destroyed in the process could be replaced somewhere else.
At least 10 fruit trees and a hedge were destroyed in Hovelange, which is situated in the municipality of Beckerich. This led to the destruction of the habitat for several different animals without a plan on how to compensate for this. The minister explained that this was why the construction work was discontinued. Dieschbourg also stated that the intervention of the Nature and Forest Administration had nothing to do with the halt to the construction work but rather with the initial enquiry to destroy a biotope. If certain conditions are met, which they were in this case, the administration will write the mandatory ecological balance itself. According to the minister, this was the case in 175 out of 560 cases since 2019.
The owner of the building allegedly received a letter by the administration in July in which she was informed that her enquiry was not complete which in turn led to a meeting being scheduled. The administration will usually be on site within two weeks while in this case it allegedly took three.
The minister is thus dismissing the view that the Nature and Forest Administration was quickly send in order to lift the halt on the construction work.
