2026-04-22

I move: That Dáil Éireann: recognises that the triple planetary crises of climate change, pollution, and biodiversity loss are an existential threat to humanity; notes that the 22nd of April, is Earth Day, where people around the world are called to stand in defence of the only home we share; declared a climate and biodiversity emergency, becoming the second national parliament in the world to do so, and in so doing recognised the importance of Ireland responding to these crises in 2019; further recognises that: — to address this challenge, the Government has committed to achieving a climate neutral economy by no later than 2050 and, through carbon budgets and the Climate Action Plan, to reduce by 51 per cent the annual greenhouse gas emissions reported for 2030 compared to 2018; — these commitments are underpinned by the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Act 2015, amended and strengthened in 2021, which acts as a foundation for the State's climate policy, and provides the legal basis for Ireland's climate ambitions; — biodiversity targets are driven by Ireland's 4th National Biodiversity Action Plan 2023-2030 (NBAP), which aims to meet international commitments, including 30 per cent protected land and marine areas by 2030, this plan is on a statutory footing, and public bodies have a duty to contribute to these targets; — achievement of these ambitions requires a Whole-of-Government approach to the decarbonisation of the energy system, the provision of electrified public transport at scale, the retrofitting of Ireland's building stock, and the development of new renewable energy sources; — the ongoing crisis in the Middle East has demonstrated that the objective of affordable, secure and decarbonised energy cannot be met through importation of fossil fuels, which are carbon intensive and subject to rapid price shocks; — in confronting the fact that 29 per cent of Irish households are in energy poverty and hundreds of thousands of electricity and gas customers are in arrears, we must ensure that in moving to a net-zero Ireland we adhere to the principles of the Just Transition Commission, and must reach those furthest behind first; — energy crises disproportionately impact the most marginalised, including one parent families, carers, disabled people, members of the Traveller community, and older people are driven by an energy system that is too reliant on expensive imported fossil fuels; and — climate change and its consequences are and will continue to have profound effects on human health and the wellbeing of future generations; notes, with concern that: — the Minister for Climate, Energy, and the Environment has indicated that the Government will miss its 2030 emissions reduction target by half, and has provided no emergency plan to reverse this trajectory; — the Environmental Protection Agency, in preparing its latest emissions projections, found that the Government had not included any significant new policies or measures in the Climate Action Plan 2025, to close the gap in meeting 2030 climate targets; — relevant Government Ministers have not yet fulfilled their duties under the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Acts to attend the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate, Environment and Energy, and outline corrective measures to meet sectoral emissions ceilings; — the Irish Fiscal Advisory Council and the Climate Change Advisory Council published a joint peer-reviewed analysis in 2025, indicating a potential €8-€26 billion in compliance costs for Ireland through missing climate targets; — the Government has proposed legislation that will fundamentally undermine the functioning of the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Act, by exempting carbon intensive projects from scrutiny under that Act; — the Government intends to increase Ireland's reliance on fossil fuels through the creation of a State-owned Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) terminal which will be reliant on imported gas and subject to geopolitical price shocks far beyond the State's control; — the enabling legislation for a State-owned LNG terminal, the Strategic Gas Emergency Reserve Bill 2025, seeks to pre-empt scrutiny of this project under Section 15 of Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Act, suggesting that the Government understands that it is not compliant with Ireland's climate targets; — an LNG terminal will lead to locked-in fossil fuel industry expansion that does not align with Ireland's binding climate obligations; — a similar provision in the Dublin Airport (Passenger Cap) Bill 2026 suggests that the Government is placing the interests of airlines ahead of the need for a healthy environment and climate action; — the newly published Critical Infrastructure Bill 2026 will allow the wholesale exclusion of carbon intensive projects from scrutiny under the Climate Action Act; — despite a target of 5 gigawatts (GW) of new offshore wind energy by 2030 under the Climate Action Plan, no new offshore wind projects have been delivered, and the projects currently planned amount to less than 5 GW; — the Government is due to fall well short of its retrofitting targets of 500,000 residential retrofits and the deployment of 400,000 heat pumps by 2030; — the National Development Plan Review 2025 has reversed the previous Government's policy of providing a ratio of 2:1 investment in public transport over new roads, which will undermine plans to improve public transport and reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the transport sector; — rapid growth in the number of data centres in Ireland has created significant induced demand for electricity, which will eliminate the net positive effect of new renewables projects and lead to increased energy prices for ordinary households; — the Government has raided the €3.15 billion Climate and Nature Fund to plug holes in its infrastructure budget; — the Marine Protected Areas Bill has yet to be published; — the Department of Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation, has disbanded its climate division; — funding for farmers to implement the NBAP is wholly inadequate; — the Final Report for Phase 2 of the National Land Use Review has been with the Minister for Climate, Energy, and the Environment, the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine and the Minister of State at Housing, Local Government and Heritage almost a year and is still not published; — the Government has not fully met its legal obligations under the Climate Act as emissions limits do not account for the Land Use, Land Use Change, and Forestry sector; — the Government has not yet addressed the recommendations of the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate, Environment and Energy regarding the preparation and delivery of Carbon Budgets 3 and 4 (2031-2040); and — the Climate Action Plan 2026 has been significantly delayed and is still not yet published; and calls on the Government to: — re-commit to the legally binding target of 51 per cent emissions reduction by 2030; — remove any provisions from draft legislation that limits the effectiveness of the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Act; — implement the recommendations of the Independent Advisory Committee on nature restoration and to adequately fund Ireland's Nature Restoration Plan; and — protect vulnerable households from the ongoing fossil fuel price crisis through new targeted supports and safeguards, by speeding up access to home energy upgrades, and by ensuring that Ireland develops its own secure and clean renewable energy. Today, 22 April, is Earth Day, a day that has been marked since 1970. For 56 years, people around the world have used this date to speak for and act for environmental protection around our planet. It is appropriate, therefore, that on Earth Day this House supports the motion I am proposing and delivers a powerful message. The energy crisis is the climate crisis. On behalf of the Green Party, I am proposing this motion as people across our country experience the consequences of another global spike in the prices of energy. The origins of this energy price crisis is our country's over-reliance on fossil fuels. The war in Iran has, for the second time in four years, shown how our economy is at the mercy of the whims of Trump, Putin, Netanyahu and of the Ayatollah. Ireland needs to be able to generate its own energy so we can make our own choices. The only way to achieve true fuel security in Ireland is to stop importing it. Our country will remain vulnerable to energy shocks until we transition our entire economy onto renewable sources of energy. Countries that have already taken this step to move to renewables have economies that are better placed to cope in the current crisis and are therefore better able to protect their own people from the worst of the energy price spike. In Spain, renewable energy now generates 50% of the country's electricity coming from wind, hydro, and, increasingly, from solar. Spain has seen dramatic growth in the use of solar power in the past six years. This is one of the contributing factors to Spain having the lowest wholesale electricity prices within the EU. This solar revolution did not come about naturally and simply as a cause of Spain enjoying a sunny climate. For decades, solar supplied only a minor part of the country's electricity. However, following the Ukraine invasion in 2022, the Spanish Government, recognising its vulnerability to international energy shocks, took a deliberate policy decision to reduce its dependence on imported gas and move much of its economy towards renewables. In Demark, over 83% of the country's electricity is generated from renewable sources: wind, bioenergy and increasingly solar. Interconnection with other Nordic countries provides an additional layer of protection. These countries have shown that governments can lead the fight on decarbonisation but at the same time create energy independence for their economies and leave all their citizens better off. Yet, over the past 15 months, the Government has demonstrated that it does not possess the belief in this transition to make the case for it convincingly to the Irish people. Therefore, on a national basis, what should Ministers be doing to progress this transformation of our energy systems? First, the Government needs to speed up the delivery of the offshore wind farms that were successfully bid for during the term of the previous Government. An Coimisiún Pleanála and the Maritime Area Regulatory Authority, MARA, need to be given additional expert staff so they can more quickly process and decide on applications for offshore winds and for large-scale solar arrays. The Government also needs to speed up investment and delivery of improvement in our ports. Right now, Belfast is the only port on the island capable of supporting the construction of offshore turbines. This has to change. We need to develop Cork and Rosslare ports so they can support the delivery of offshore wind but also that they can enjoy the benefits of the support industries and the economic development that will gather around sites where electricity generated by wind is brought onshore. We need big and bold actions. The urgency with which we need to protect Irish households from this energy price shock, and the next one that probably is not far down the road. Over the past two months the Government has allocated over €750 million in new emergency spending to deal with the energy crisis. While this money is needed to protect households and businesses from the current crisis, not one cent of that money works to protect or prevent either our economy nationally or individual households from experiencing a similar price spike the next time there is a global emergency. A total of €750 million spent and it is all entirely reactive, entirely short-term and in no way changes or reduces our vulnerability. I want to make three suggestions about what this bold action could look like. The Green Party proposes a new fully-free solar programme for all households in receipt of the fuel allowance. Eight solar panels will be provided to each home. This will mean solar will reach the most vulnerable households more quickly. It will reduce their energy bills at a time we know they can be subject to rapid price shocks. Investing €400 million a year for five years, which is about half the cost of the package that was agreed last week, would provide free solar energy to hundreds of thousands of energy-poor households. Second, we propose that the Government creates a social leasing scheme for electric vehicles, EVs, for essential workers. This will be based on a scheme operated by the French Government over the past two years. As a social leasing scheme, it would operate where small-scale electric cars would be leased on a five-year basis by the State to essential workers who need to drive to work or have limited transport alternatives. This model, with the State making an initial contribution to reduce the monthly cost, would remove what we all recognise as the biggest barrier to EV uptake, namely, high upfront costs. An upfront investment of €500 million, about two-thirds of what was agreed in the emergency package signed off last week, would deliver 70,000 small electric vehicles under this scheme. These schemes are not cheap. Activating them would mean upending our spending plans this year and next year, and I am sure it would cause a couple of furrowed brows on officials of the Department of public expenditure as well. However, at a time we are in the enviable situation to be one of a small number of European countries reporting a significant budget surplus, that we would go through a second energy crisis, again driven by our dependence on imported fossil fuels, and not take big and bold action to reduce our dependence, would be a failure to act as an act of national self-sabotage. We must acknowledge that the climate crisis is the energy crisis and that the solutions are not cheap but understand that once those solutions are invested in, they can bring immediate savings to hard-pressed households, will lessen our energy insecurity and have the added benefit of decarbonising our economy. Our third proposal does not require major State expenditure. Over the past number of months, the Green Party and I have been urging the Government to allow for the deployment of plug-in solar in Irish homes and to take what steps that are needed to resolve any safety concerns related to it. In March, in response to the current energy crisis, the UK Government announced it would make plug-in solar panels available to British households. These easy-to-install panels have become commonplace in Germany. Over 1 million units have been installed. They are sold by major retailers. They are affordable and are easy to install. They can be used in apartments that cannot have rooftop solar and in rental properties as well. We know these panels could save people money on their bills now in the midst of an energy crisis. I asked the Taoiseach about this issue last month. I have questioned the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, on a number of occasions yet there is still no clarity on how or when any technical issues regarding the large-scale deployment of plug-in solar in Ireland will be addressed. The actions needed to shift our economy to renewables are not only taken at State level. Communities are coming together to fill the gap Government inaction has left. The Ennis Environmental Action Group has led a voluntary public information campaign to inform neighbours and friends about the grants available under SEAI schemes. This work has led to a 2.6-fold increase in applications to the warmers homes scheme in that area. This sort of effective peer-to-peer sharing of information is helping to better spread information, but also break down preconceived notions about these schemes. At a time we know people are looking to better understand how the retrofit process works, I ask the Government to look at what the Ennis Environmental Action Group did and how it was able to make the case for transition within its community. The argument for changing our economy to run on renewables is no longer just an environmental one. The cost-of-living consequences of sticking with imported oil and gas should not be borne by another generation of Irish householders. The energy crisis is the climate crisis and as a country, we have the natural resources to allow us to produce renewable energy at scale-----

Thank you, Deputy.

-----and right now we have the financial resources to support the development of these new industries.

Thank you, Deputy.

Let us not wait until the next war or the next fuel crisis; let us act now.

I will take three and a half minutes. We are in a situation now where the Government is set to miss its 2030 emissions reduction targets by half and there is no plan to reverse that trajectory. The Environmental Protection Agency's, EPA's, latest reports found the Government has not included any new policies or measures in the climate action plan to 2050 and we will pay for this because €8 billion to €26 billion in compliance costs for missing targets can be imposed. The Government is also encouraging carbon-intensive projects. It is legislating for a State-owned LNG terminal. It is lifting the passenger cap in Dublin Airport, missing retrofitting targets and encouraging data centres, and it is boasting about that as well. The Government has utterly reversed - it is not going forward - in climate action and it is following a trend worldwide, where governments have no interest whatsoever. That includes governments that are considered climate deniers like Trump's, but the same goes for the Irish Government. I will mention the dependence on fossil fuels and the food crisis, which the recent protests exemplified. The crisis caused by the US-Israel war on Iran, which the Government sat silently by about when it visited Trump, has highlighted the addiction of capitalism to fossil fuels, utter dependence on intensive agriculture, which is being developed and deepened in this country, and a huge dependence on synthetic fertiliser and pesticides and Gulf-based fossil fuels. It has been warned that if this crisis persists, fertiliser prices will increase and ultimately food prices will rocket, causing huge problems for the poorest people on the planet, but also for western economies. In Ireland, if anything was shown by the recent developments, it was that we should introduce free public transport. It has been done in other countries. The Government is way behind on retrofitting. It is a model that requires large amounts of money upfront and it needs to be rolled out across all homes, not just for people who already have very nice incomes and homes. There is huge energy poverty in Ireland. The motion cites that almost one third of households are in energy poverty. There are huge arrears on gas and electricity bills. The ESB needs to be taken back into public ownership and run on a break-even basis. We should not just be subsidising profitable companies with one-off payments. LNG is a dirty fossil fuel. Let us be clear. There should be no more fossil fuel infrastructure because if it is set up, it will encourage it to be developed yet again. It is not just a stopgap. It will increase our dependence on fossil fuels. We need to invest in renewables and stop this dependence on fossil fuels.

I thank Deputy O'Gorman and the Green Party for tabling the motion, which we support. We have also tabled two amendments, which I will mention later. The main point is that history will not treat this Government kindly, if history gets to be written. Maybe that is what it is counting on. One after another, the Government is ripping up its climate commitments relating to LNG, data centres, public transport, nitrates, marine protected areas, MPAs, forestry, you name it. The Fianna Fáil-Fine Gael-Lowry lackey Government is going backwards. It is no coincidence this is happening. Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and whoever is in government with them serve the interests of big business. That is who benefits from the expansion of data centres, extending the nitrates derogation and locking us in to fossil fuel dependence on LNG. Recently, a booklet called Sitka Spruce the Amazing Timber Tree was distributed to Irish schools. It included an endorsement from the then Minister of State with responsibility for forestry, waffling about forests being homes for birds and animals - not if they are Sitka spruce, they are not. These plantations are biodiversity dead zones and should never be promoted as a solution to the climate or biodiversity crisis. Deputy Michael Healy-Rae might have resigned but his cynical pro-business greenwashing attitude lives on. It is shown in the Government's amendment, which ignores the core demand of this motion, that is, for the Government to recommit to reducing carbon emissions by 51% by 2030, a supposedly legally binding commitment. Instead, we get vague waffle about being "fully committed to ... climate ambition". However, the only semi-concrete target mentioned is climate neutrality by 2050. The Government is also trumpeting an €18.9 billion investment in the national grid. What it fails to mention is that this will be swallowed up by data centres, just like they have swallowed up the increase in renewable energy in recent years. The Government has gone all-in on the AI bubble, so all this grid expansion will go to big tech too and it wants workers to pay for it through higher household energy bills. That is what People Before Profit's amendments are about. We say ordinary people should not have to pay for a climate crisis caused by capitalism. It is why we have always opposed the carbon tax - not just increases to it, but the entire tax. It is time to make big polluters pay. The Green Party motion notes the rapid growth in data centres in Ireland will lead to increased household energy prices. It leaves out that it has done that already, including under the previous Green Party coalition, and it does nothing to fix it. Our amendments are about banning the building of any more data centres, taxing existing data centres to fund a €500 energy credit for households and making sure data centres pay the same price for electricity as households and not half price as they do currently. Our amendments also call for making public transport free and the expansion of bus and rail services. It makes no sense that during a fuel crisis, the Government is cutting taxes on petrol and diesel, which we welcome, but doing nothing to incentivise people to use public transport. Fares are being abolished in Australia in response to the current energy crisis. The same needs to happen here.

I thank Deputy O'Gorman and his staff for bringing forward this important motion. I particularly want to share my concern that despite a target of 5 GW of offshore wind energy by 2030, no offshore wind projects have been delivered. Ireland has huge potential to become a global leader in wind energy, particularly through offshore developments. County Donegal has immense potential given where it is situated and the amount of wind we gather off the Atlantic Ocean and it would benefit hugely from developing offshore wind. I have spoken previously about the severe deterioration of the fishing industry and what we have seen in recent years. Due to the decline, many fishers are forced to find work abroad. Given the nature of the work and their area of expertise, naturally many of them look for offshore work, but instead of availing of work in Ireland, they are forced to go away to England, Scotland and Germany. The Minister of State would be shocked to know how many constituents in Donegal have to go abroad to find maritime work. Given that we are an island nation with huge volumes of wind and marine resources, surely we should be able to provide plenty of work here. Surely fishing towns in Donegal such as Killybegs and Greencastle would be prime spots in which to develop offshore wind energy, but once again, we have been held back by a lack of infrastructure. In a session of the Joint Committee on Fisheries and Maritime Affairs, I was told by Wind Energy Ireland that Donegal has the wind and good water depths, particularly inshore towards Donegal Bay. At present, it is challenging for us to generate offshore energy in Donegal because of the electricity grid; it needs to be updated. The lack of grid is probably one of the biggest challenges facing us. To get electricity out of Donegal, we will need a stronger grid so investment is essential. We can harvest it but we cannot take it ashore. In 2025, 13% of the cheapest electricity was wasted because of the grid. It is simply not strong enough to carry the power that comes from the wind farms and most of the wind farms are left dormant; they are not moving. We have had to switch the turbines off at time which is absolutely crazy when they could be generating power. The figure is significantly higher in the northwest where the electricity grid is at its weakest. It is a disgraceful waste when the potential is there, but we have to have the courage and to invest. We have to invest in the future, now. In Donegal, if we had a more advanced, up to date grid, that could handle this we could be in a prime location to harvest the power and take it ashore. The wind breaking technology is there. Wave breakers are all over the north of Scotland and they are generating power. We have to have the courage, we have to have the belief and deliver.

I move amendment No. 1: To delete all words after "Dáil Éireann" and substitute the following: "affirms that, the Government: — is fully committed to delivering on Ireland's climate ambition across all sectors, and to progress climate action in a planned and coherent way in pursuit of the National Climate Objective of a climate neutral economy by 2050, in a way that ensures that sustainability, affordability, competitiveness and energy security are all central to our future climate planning; and — is acutely aware of the impact on households and businesses of the recent increases in fuel prices, and is progressing both immediate and longer-term measures to support households with these costs; notes that: — work is ongoing across the Government to deliver on climate commitments and accelerate climate mitigation efforts every day, supported by unprecedented Government funding across the National Development Plan (NDP), which will fund major upgrades to deliver carbon emission reductions, including major public transport projects, more efficient public buildings, and supports an €18.9 billion investment into the Irish electricity grid; — this Government is committed to the delivery of major public transport projects, the NDP Sectoral Investment Plan for Transport, published in November, provided €10.1 billion for public transport, as well as an additional €2 billion from the Infrastructure, Climate and Nature Fund to progress MetroLink, giving a total of €12.1 billion for public transport, this compares to an allocation of approximately €8.7 billion for roads capital investment; — the unprecedented €505 million worth of practical measures introduced by the Government on 12th April, included: — further reductions in excise duty on diesel, petrol and marked gas oil (green diesel) in addition to a deferral of the planned increase in carbon tax, scheduled 1st May until October 2026; and — reductions in excise duty, including the National Oil Reserves Agency levy reduction with effect from midnight on 14th April and will run until 31st July, 2026; — Government will also be establishing a new road transporters' support scheme, as well as supports for coach operators providing local link services, at a cost of €40 million per month for three months; — a comprehensive €100 million Fuel Subsidy Support Scheme to assist farmers, agricultural contractors and fishers will be put in place; — this package of supports is in addition to the measures announced in March, which included: — an expansion of the diesel rebate scheme, backdating it to January, to help sectors of the economy most impacted by the rise of fuel costs; and — an extension of the fuel allowance season to help the most vulnerable with the cost of home heating; — the Government has established the National Energy Affordability Taskforce, to identify and implement additional measures that will enhance energy affordability for households and businesses while delivering key renewable commitments and protecting security of supply and economic stability; — the Environmental Protection Agency's most recent emissions reporting confirms progress in delivering on climate action and records that Ireland has recorded overall greenhouse gas emission reductions for a third consecutive year, with a decrease of 6.8 per cent in 2023 followed by a further 2 per cent reduction in 2024, this is despite the concurrent increase of approximately 1.5 million people, more than one million new homes and over one million extra vehicles on our roads; — Ireland is a world leader in electricity generation from renewables which has increased fivefold since 2005, and that in February 2026 wind energy provided a record 50 per cent of the State's electricity; — Ireland has now reached a record circa 8 gigawatts (GW) of renewable generation capacity, up from 4.8 GW in 2020, and renewable energy provided half of Ireland's energy in March 2026; — the Government is committed to 5 GW of installed offshore wind capacity, with 5 Phase One projects all currently being progressed through the planning system, and the Government is also aiming for 20 GW of offshore wind by 2040 to help power a new green industrial revolution; — the Offshore Renewable Electricity Support Scheme Tonn Nua site, offshore wind auction was successfully concluded in November 2025; and — the 2025 Zero-Emission Vehicle Intelligence target for electrical vehicle sales of 195,000 was surpassed in October 2025, and Electric Vehicle sales are now at over 227,000; — the Climate Action Plan 2025 and its predecessor, Climate Action Plan 2024, provide a strong framework for continued delivery of climate action across all sectors each and every day, including measures and actions that are multi-annual in nature and effect, and the Government is committed to supporting their implementation; — projected costs of compliance with the European Union (EU) climate and energy targets have not been confirmed at this point in time and that there are several routes to compliance available within the overarching EU framework, and the Government's focus is on implementing the measures at hand; — the Critical Infrastructure Bill 2026 is a targeted piece of legislation that allows the Government to designate certain critical projects or programmes as critical infrastructure, including: — grid infrastructure which is vital for Ireland's climate, societal and economic objectives, it does not seek to undermine the functioning of the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Act; — climate considerations will continue to be fully integrated into decision-making processes, including through the planning system and national policy framework, even where limited and exceptional provisions apply; — the Government's position on the need for a State-operated Strategic Gas Emergency Reserve, in the form Liquified Natural Gas, has been clear - it is a priority project of a strategic nature required to mitigate the major consequences for our society and our economy that would arise if Ireland was to experience an interruption to our gas supplies via subsea interconnection; — the proposed Dublin Airport (Passenger Cap) Bill 2026 will enable the sustainable development of Dublin Airport, with full regard to environmental constraints, legal obligations, and the independent regulatory role of the Irish Aviation Authority, while supporting national connectivity and economic resilience; — the National Residential Retrofit Plan 2026, announced on 27th January, introduced a number of new and expanded measures to make energy upgrades more affordable, and accessible to many more homeowners; — in Budget 2026, the Government provided a record allocation of €640 million, targeting 73,000 home energy upgrades this year, this includes a record €340 million for the Warmer Homes Scheme which provides fully funded upgrades for those in energy poverty and will target 11,500 upgrades this year; — capital expenditure of over €1.7 billion has delivered over 257,500 home energy upgrades from 2019 to end Q1 2026, and there are already over 170,000 heat pumps in existing homes and businesses across the country; — the 4th National Biodiversity Action Plan, which was published in January 2024, strives for a 'whole-of-Government, whole-of-society' approach to the governance and conservation of biodiversity; — the finalisation of the Report for Phase 2 of the National Land Use Review is advancing with a view to publishing later this year; — work is ongoing on the general scheme of the Bill to amend the Maritime Area Planning Act 2021, to provide for marine protected area designation through the National Designated Maritime Area Plan (DMAP) process with a view to bringing forward proposals this year; and — the MPA LIFE Ireland project (2024-2033) has been working at a practical level to help deliver Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) in Ireland in line with the DMAP process and the principles of public participation, co-design, co-development and co-delivery, this nine-year €25 million project co-funded by the EU will focus on the social, economic and ecological dimensions of MPA designation.". I very much welcome any opportunity to discuss sustainability, renewable energy, opportunities to reduce emissions and, of course, biodiversity and nature restoration. It strikes me, though, that we do not debate nature restoration and biodiversity enough in the House. Even in the 20 minutes the Opposition had to put forward their case on the motion, which alludes to nature restoration, ten seconds of it referenced biodiversity in nature. In fairness, Deputy Murphy referenced MPAs, Sitka spruce plantations and water quality but Deputy O'Gorman had ten minutes to begin and did not reference nature and biodiversity. It strikes me how low a priority nature and nature restoration are on the Opposition benches. That said, I welcome the opportunity to discuss the motion. The Government has tabled a countermotion. We must oppose this motion because it calls for a restatement of commitments already in law, does not reflect established statutory and parliamentary processes and fails to acknowledge the significant body of work under way across government. Let me be clear from the outset that the Government is fully committed to delivering on Ireland’s climate ambition across all sectors, and to progressing climate action in a planned and coherent way. Our approach ensures that sustainability, affordability, competitiveness and energy security remain central to policy. We are also acutely aware of the impact on households and businesses of recent increases in energy and fuel prices. Energy affordability is a core priority and that is why we have taken action by introducing one of the most comprehensive support packages in the European Union. The motion draws attention to concerns regarding the State’s current trajectory, suggesting a lack of progress. The facts, however, demonstrate a very different reality. The EPA’s most recent emissions report confirms our progress, recording overall greenhouse gas, GHG, emission reductions for a third consecutive year. We saw a decrease of 6.8% in 2023, followed by a further 2% reduction in 2024. Ireland now has the lowest level of GHG emissions in 35 years, despite the concurrent increase of approximately 1.5 million people, the construction of more than 1 million new homes and over 1 million additional vehicles on our roads. Work is ongoing across government every single day to accelerate climate mitigation efforts. We are undergoing a renewables-led energy transformation. Ireland is a world leader in renewable electricity generation, which has increased fivefold since 2005. We have now reached approximately 8 GW of renewable generation capacity, up significantly from 2020 levels. In February this year, wind energy provided a record 50% of the State’s electricity. The Government is prioritising offshore wind, with five phase one projects currently progressing through the planning system. The offshore renewable electricity support scheme, ORESS, Tonn Nua offshore wind auction concluded successfully last year and will make a major contribution to Ireland’s clean electricity supply. We are also advancing the solar for schools programme, which successfully completed installations in over 2,000 schools as of 2025. To attract the next generation of investment in strategic energy-intensive sectors, our large energy user action plan is deploying a plan-led approach to co-ordinate the delivery of key enabling infrastructure, ensuring that long-term industrial growth is fully aligned with Ireland’s green transition. To support this rapid transition, we are backing our ambitions with unprecedented investment. The Government has approved an unprecedented €18.9 billion investment in the electricity grid. In the transport sector, the national development plan sectoral investment plan provided €10.1 billion for public transport, alongside major projects such as MetroLink and the DART+ programme. Electric vehicle uptake also continues to grow. We are delivering warmer, more comfortable homes through the national residential retrofit plan. Since 2019, more than 257,500 home energy upgrades have been delivered. In budget 2026, the Government provided a record allocation of €640 million, targeting 73,000 home energy upgrades this year. This funding includes a record €340 million for the warmer homes scheme, supporting those experiencing energy poverty. I want to speak to what we are doing on biodiversity and nature. I fully accept and appreciate, as the Minister of State with responsibility for this area, that we have a massive tide to turn in terms of the loss of species and of habitats. We are leaving no stone unturned when it comes to restoring nature. We will soon have an amendment to the Maritime Area Planning Act 2021 where we will see MPA legislation included. This will set the way very shortly after for MPAs to be designated. For the first time ever, in budget 2026 there was an allocation of €100 million for the National Parks and Wildlife Service, which allows us to put in place a structure where we can restore nature across the board. I will give a brief example of what this looks like. I recently visited counties Galway and Mayo where I saw the extraordinary work being done by the Wild Atlantic Nature LIFE project there. They are investing in the restoration of habitats and the removal of invasive species. There are so many wins in this approach. First, the farmer or landowner is getting paid to participate in this scheme, so they win. Second, the local development companies are leading out on this. The local development companies who employ so many people locally are administering and putting in place the measures to ensure this can be done at scale. One of the big benefits is that the same farmers and fishermen, who are in the west where it can be more difficult to earn a decent income, are the ones being employed directly by the local development partnership to actually carry out this work, including to remove invasive species and restore peatland habitats, for example. We will increase the scale of this; we will scale it up. There are even more benefits because the rhododendrons they are removing is being processed and turned into a biochar, which has so many benefits for farming and renewable energy. To say there is nothing happening in that area would be completely unfair and the advisory committee's recommendations will be published shortly. Despite this substantial body of work, the motion presents several demands that are either unnecessary, inaccurate or premature. First, it calls on the Government to recommit to the legally binding target of a 51% emissions reduction by 2030. As that target already is provided for in law under the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Act 2015, no further recommitment is required. Second, the motion expresses concern that the Critical Infrastructure Bill 2026 limits the effectiveness of the climate Act. This is incorrect. The Bill is a targeted measure to accelerate delivery of certain critical projects including vital grid infrastructure. It does not seek to undermine the functioning of the climate Act nor does it disapply climate obligations. Climate considerations will continue to apply through planning and wider statutory processes. Many of the projects that will be supported by this Bill are of strategic importance to the State’s climate action ambition, including critical electricity infrastructure and public transport projects. Without these projects, we will not be able to meet our overall climate targets and delays in their delivery will have significant negative consequences in this regard. Third, the motion mischaracterises the proposed strategic gas emergency reserve. The Government’s position on this has been clear. This is a priority project of a strategic nature required to mitigate the major consequences for our society and our economy that would arise if Ireland were to experience an interruption to our gas supplies via subsea interconnection. It is a State-led, transitional reserve intended strictly for emergency use and it will be divested when it is no longer required to secure our energy systems. Fourth, the motion demands the immediate implementation of the recommendations of the independent advisory committee on nature restoration. We have not published the recommendations yet. This will be launched on 29 April and anyone who wishes to attend is more than welcome. Fifth, the motion calls for the removal of provisions from the draft legislation that limit the effectiveness of the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Act. It is a matter for the Oireachtas through the established legislative processes to scrutinise proposed legislation as it is progressed through the various stages. It is through these established democratic procedures that legislative proposals are examined, refined and determined, rather than through sweeping motions that overlook existing statutory frameworks. The Government's counter-motion reflects the reality of the decisive actions already being taken and the commitments already in place. It offers a balanced, practical and deliverable path forward. We are making tangible, measurable progress in reducing emissions, expanding renewable energy, improving affordability and advancing the conservation of our biodiversity. We have the plans, the legislative framework and the unprecedented investment in place to deliver on our climate ambitions. I reiterate that the Government rejects the Independent and Parties Technical Group motion and proposes a Government counter-motion that more accurately reflects the reality of the situation.

The programme for Government commits to intensifying the transition to lower cost renewables and electricity generation and to transitioning away from imported fossil fuels. We can see just how expensive fossil fuels can be since the illegal US war on Iran, just how dependent we are on them and how vulnerable that makes us to price shocks. Successive Governments have been too slow to move away from expensive, imported fossil fuels and worse still, are now reversing the existing policy. The Government must expedite investment in our renewable energy infrastructure to insulate us from the worst impacts of the turmoil of a world oil supply shock. In the long run, the only way to prepare for future energy shocks is to invest substantially in our energy infrastructure. Offshore wind and wave power should be the priority and funds from the Infrastructure, Climate and Nature Fund should be used for that. The energy crisis and climate change disproportionately impact the most marginalised. Efforts to address climate change, like carbon tax, the cost of retrofitting and electric cars, also affect PAYE workers, one-parent families, carers, the disabled and older people the most. A total of 29% of households are in energy poverty, 300,000 families are in arrears with their electricity bills and 180,000 are in arrears with gas bills. As a result, the just transition measures are absolutely vital. Low-cost, even free, public transport is a key issue in climate policy, particularly in constituencies like Tipperary South where public transport is limited, to say the least. If you work in south Tipperary in somewhere like Clonmel and work in any of the local industries like Abbott; Boston Scientific; Merck, Sharp and Dohme; Medite of Europe; Tipperary County Council; or Tipperary University Hospital, you must drive to work. Low-cost or free public transport must be put in place. The town bus service in Clonmel has been an outstanding success and this service should be rolled out to other areas in the town, like Old Bridge, Powerstown, Redmondstown and Clerihan. Crucially, it should be extended to other towns in the county, like Carrick-on-Suir, Cahir, Cashel, Tipperary town and Fethard. This would be hugely advantageous from a climate point of view and also from a societal point of view. The Government will fail dismally to meet the retrofitting targets of 500,000 home retrofits and 400,000 heat pumps by 2030. These schemes must be ramped up considerably and delays under the warmer home scheme - a very good scheme - are unacceptable. Two years is not simply good enough. The retrofitting of local authority houses must also be put in place. It is currently moving at a snail's pace and is almost non-existent. The projected budget surplus of an additional €4 billion must be used to do that.

I thank Deputy O'Gorman for bringing forward this important motion. He is absolutely right to highlight the need for the Government to recommit in a serious way because it seems to have abandoned any serious effort to address the climate and biodiversity crisis that threatens our planet, threatens the ability of the planet to sustain human life in the long run and will certainly impose a huge cost on ordinary people unless it is addressed and addressed as a matter of urgency. It seems that this is one of the many areas in which this Government has bent the knee to Trump and his climate denialism, his warmongering and his obnoxious agenda in general. Pulling back from any serious efforts, giving up and abandoning to a significant extent attempts to deal with the climate and biodiversity crisis is another one of those pretty pathetic submissions to the Trump agenda. You can look at what Trump's warmongering has now done. It is not only raining down death and destruction - by the way, all of that is an environmental disaster and if that level of militarism continues, the destruction of the climate is an absolute guarantee - but it is also imposing a huge economic and financial cost on ordinary people here. We saw the consequences of that. We need to address this. That means recommitting to the climate targets and addressing biodiversity and things like the marine protected areas, which the Government has dragged its heels on. There is a pathetically low level of protection of our marine area and the biodiversity in it. What is absolutely critical - this is where I have a genuine disagreement with Deputy O'Gorman and others in the House, including on the left - is that it has to be a just transition. For the 320,000 people who are in electricity arrears, the 180,000 people who are in gas arrears and the one in four people who are suffering energy poverty, according to the ESRI, any further imposition on them of a financial cost over issues like energy flies in the face of any suggestion of a just transition. That is why we oppose the carbon tax. You are discrediting the climate agenda by saying that ordinary people should pay carbon taxes when they are not profiting from the destruction of the environment. They have no choice about the energy they use. We should be targeting the people who profit from the destruction of the environment. That means the fossil fuel companies, the data centres and the people who are actually holding up the addressing of the climate and biodiversity crisis or, worse, profiting from it. We need to actively encourage people to buy into the green agenda by supporting things like free public transport, giving things like energy credits and rolling out free retrofits, which are paid for through progressive taxation. That is the sort of thing that can bring ordinary people on side with the urgent need to address the climate and biodiversity crisis.

I welcome the very comprehensive motion that has been set out by Deputy O'Gorman. It is now accepted that we will miss our 2030 binding target of a 51% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. At last, Ministers are accepting that. The Government has failed to develop offshore wind energy, anaerobic digestion and hydrogeneration, and it is only starting with solar. This means just not climate and environmental damage but also economic damage. The Irish Fiscal Advisory Council and the Climate Change Advisory Council estimate that we face fines of between €8 billion and €26 billion due to our failure to meet our international obligations, which are also moral obligations. Meanwhile data centres continue to be built at pace. They are currently using almost one quarter of our electricity supply, but sure it is okay; we will supply them with electricity for roughly half the cost of what Joe and Mary Public pay in their household. The next big, bright idea is that we will import fracked gas from America. During Trump's recent pronouncements, he said we need to do this. When the Taoiseach was over there, I heard him talking about it. We will have it in a floating terminal in the Shannon Estuary, even though the exploration and extraction of fracked gas is banned here. The latest one is the Critical Infrastructure Bill. This is the next thing coming down the line. One section alone - section 7 - is there for no other purpose than to facilitate huge environmental destruction at the stroke of a Minister's pen and this needs to be stopped. It is clearly designed to override any environmental concerns the county councils, local communities or anybody else has. The Minister can simply disregard the scientific evidence of extensive climate damage and overrule it. Guess what? It will facilitate private investors along with public projects. It is clear what we are doing. We are dancing to the tune of the American Chamber of Commerce. We are being told our economic model is broken so we will just keep going with it; we will just keep jumping in. That is what the Government is doing here. Projects will be given the green light and planners at local authority level and scientists will just have to look on in horror. Data centres, fracked gas terminals and all sorts of dodgy mining will be made easy. Instead, the Government should speed up the delivery of offshore wind energy, wave energy, anaerobic digestion which it has completely ignored, hydro which it has completely ignored, and solar which is only moving at a snail's pace. It should ease the tax burden on HVO fuels for heavy transport and buses. It needs to expand the home retrofit scheme to reduce the amount of fuel used and speed up the warmer home scheme.

World Earth Day is a day that should be about hope, urgency and leadership but the truth is that the Government has failed on climate action. It has failed on fairness and has failed on any kind of just transition. If emissions continue on their current path, climate change will have profound consequences for Ireland. We can see the warning signs already: more frequent flooding; stronger storms along the coasts; rising sea levels threatening coastal communities; and increased pressure on farming from unpredictable weather, drought and flooding. Our food system, biodiversity, water quality and public health will all be put at risk, and Irish towns will face repeated flood damage. These impacts are not distant or abstract; they are happening now. There was some mention earlier of plantations and biodiversity. Nowhere is this more real or apparent than in the tributaries of the River Feale in Listowel, the Abha Bheag and the Smearlagh. Not only has the biodiversity been decimated in that area in that there are no brown trout left in the rivers, but it has been completely wrecked by the plantations of Sitka spruce. We saw the flooding in Listowel two weeks before the election which has not yet been analysed in the reports that have been published. Because of the plantations, because of the vertical drainage, a surge came from heavy rain and flooded two or three parts of Listowel town. That has never been addressed but I would put it down directly to the plantations upriver. As I said, the impacts are not distant; they are happening now. Ambitious climate action is not optional; it is essential. Acting now means protecting communities, safeguarding rural livelihoods and ensuring that energy security in an unstable world is prioritised. There should be ambition but there should also be fairness. Climate action will only succeed if it brings people with it. Lowering energy bills, expanding affordable alternatives, investing in renewables, resilience and ambitious transition is the only way to protect Ireland's future while no one is left behind. Unfortunately, the record of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael on climate action is littered with missed targets and broken promises. They promised that today's pain would bring progress tomorrow. They assured us that carbon taxes would change behaviour and they consoled us in the face of skyrocketing prices by telling us that better things were around the corner, but that is incorrect. Ordinary people are paying the price because we have not seen a just transition. In fact, it is the opposite; ordinary people are being punished by Fine Gael, Fianna Fáil and even the Greens, all because they cannot afford to transition. Sinn Féin recognises the magnitude of what is before us. We see that urgent and ambitious action must be taken. We have to get it right and we are not going to do that with the approach that has been taken to date. This is eco-austerity. Sinn Féin has repeatedly warned the House from the very beginning that the Government's approach could never work due to the inequitable outcomes. Regressive measures that prioritise eco-austerity over just transition produce growing resentment and fear among ordinary people. They fail to leverage climate action and actually set us back. As the criticisms grow, it is getting harder for the Government to ignore the mounting evidence. We are deeply dependent on imported fossil fuels, emissions reductions are lagging, climate targets are slipping and energy independence is starting to look like another opportunity that has been let slip through the Government's fingers. That is the legacy of this Government. The reality of what people are dealing with in the cost-of-living crisis is that families are being crushed. The balance is not right and Government is completely out of touch. We have the highest electricity prices in the European Union. While households are being fleeced, giant data centres are getting sweetheart deals. Families are paying six to eight times more in network charges than data centres. Let us call it what it is. Households are paying for grid updates driven by massive corporate demand and corporations are not paying their fair share. That is a political choice made by this Government. The solutions are there to end the rip-off but the political will is not. After the war in Ukraine and now what is happening in the Middle East, global instability is being exploited and corporations are cashing in. Still, for three years the Government has failed or refused to give the energy regulator extra powers to tackle price gouging and anti-competitive behaviour. Sinn Féin would act to regulate standing charges, enhance transparency and make sure that the biggest users of energy pay their fair share because households should not be doing it. There is a design flaw in the energy system that is not designed to serve the people. As I said, we are dangerously overdependent on imported fossil fuels with 94% of imported energy fossil-fuel based. There is a clear way out of this which is the delivery of Irish energy independence, not as one Government Minister says by sitting on their hands and navel gazing about offshore wind but delivering.

Climate change has real and profound implications for us here in Ireland and right across the world. Here in Ireland, as globally, it is most likely those on the lowest incomes and the poorest who will potentially pay the highest price. I think the Irish people understand that very clearly. Sometimes when listening to these debates, we might imagine that the Irish people are yet to be persuaded that climate change is real and we need to tackle it. I do not believe that is the case. Of course, there will always be a need to continue to highlight these issues but in my experience, people are more aware than ever. I see more enthusiasm for tiny towns, biodiversity projects and river cleaning than I have ever experienced. However, the frustration people have is that they feel their efforts are not only being undermined but being completely wiped out ten times over by the policies of this Government. The efforts that people make by recycling, reducing their energy and upgrading their homes disappear into a puff of vapour when compared with sweetheart deals that are being provided for data centres. We have the absolutely glacial pace of delivery of retrofitting and likewise with renewable energy. Of course, it is frustrating for people when they are making these efforts when they are trying to make decisions in their own life and they are seeing the effective subsidisation of these enormous energy consumers, such as data centres. We have some of the highest energy prices in Europe particularly when it comes to electricity and people are absolutely crippled with it. This affects domestic users and also small and medium-sized businesses. When I talk to the owners of small and medium-sized businesses about the pressures they face, energy costs are right up there and nowhere near enough is being done. What is happening with renewables is incredibly frustrating. We could have had the same debate ten years ago and we would be saying every community building and school across the State should have solar panels and they should be supported to do so. A comparatively very small number of them do, even though the appetite is there, because the Government schemes are not there to support it. Looking at the current crisis that we face, we are more vulnerable than most countries across Europe to rising oil and gas prices because of the Government's failure. Companies that have looked to invest in wind energy, particularly floating offshore wind, have taken their resources and invested elsewhere because the pace is so slow here. The Government is set to miss its 2030 targets by a country mile. The opportunities for Ireland are huge as well as our obligations in terms of reducing emissions. Tá deis dhochreidte ann, go mór mór timpeall an chósta, do phobail, do chathracha agus do bhailte ach níl an Rialtas ag baint buntáiste aisti. Níl sé sin maith go leor. Ordinary Irish consumers will pay the price and the planet will pay the price for the failure to deliver on renewables. It is totally inadequate.

As the Minister of State knows, housing is the number one social crisis currently affecting the State and the cost-of-living crisis is the most immediate economic challenge. However, climate change represents an existential challenge, not just in this country but across the entire planet. We can see every single day the impacts in urban and rural Ireland as well as elsewhere in the world of the failure of governments, particularly those in wealthy countries, to meet their emissions reductions targets. As others have said before, this Government is on course to miss its targets. They are not just legally binding targets; they are scientifically established targets for emissions reductions to deal with the threat of climate change. To make matters worse, the Government is pursuing a policy that is heaping the majority of the cost of emissions reductions on families, workers, and small and medium-sized businesses. That is imposing enormous pain, particularly at a time of a cost-of-living crisis. Then, of course, there are others in this House and outside it who want to minimise, if not outright deny, the fact that climate change is real. They want to simply continue as things are. The consequence of Government failure and climate denial by others is that public confidence in meaningful climate action is being undermined. The solution, of course, and what people are calling for, is the just transition outlined by my colleagues and others. That is front-loading investment in critical renewable energy, in public transport and in a retrofit programme that meets people's needs, not one based on their ability to pay, and prioritises energy for households, employers and workers, not data centres. There is a relationship between this and the protests that have taken place across the State in recent times. While they are primarily about the failure of the Government to tackle the cost-of-living crisis, they are being exacerbated by its climate policies: overdependence on fossil fuels, failure to provide adequate green transport infrastructure or public transport infrastructure, and just not listening to communities. Aidan Regan, a political economist from UCD, made a very interesting observation recently. He said governments here and elsewhere are faced with a trilemma in that they are trying to reconcile three irreconcilables: a model of economic growth that is deeply unfair and unsustainable, and a climate policy focused on carbon taxes and pricing, heaping the burden on workers and families, all the while undermining public confidence in democracy. He makes an appeal for a change and for progressive politicians to build an alternative alliance, one that focuses climate mitigation costs on the very wealthy corporations and individuals, provides a just green transition for workers and families and restores proper democracy. That is the solution to this crisis.

The question is: where is the just transition? The people out there do not feel it and do not see it. I do not know how many times I have used the term in here. We talk about Ireland being a wind superpower but that is all we are talking about. We will talk about the difficulties that arose when switching from developer-led to planning-led systems but the fact is that we have not been able to fundamentally make use of that one serious resource we have in the form of wind. I have not seen any adequate speed-up or streamlining of the system to improve this. We do this at a time when we have seen multiple reasons to do it on the basis of, obviously, improving the environment, even from an energy security point of view, the issues that have arisen in relation to the Russian war against Ukraine and the absolutely disastrous, illegal war being fought by the Americans at the behest of Israel against Iran. We do not even know long term where that will go. Obviously, it is very hard not to talk at this point in time about the fuel protests. That is accepting that we are not in a world where renewables can offer solutions that are necessary as regards vehicular transport from the point of view of farmers and hauliers at this point in time. We know, however, that we could separate out our reliance on fossil fuels from an energy production point of view. That, at least from the State's point of view, would be a real win but again when we talk about just transition, the Government, in its defence of carbon taxes, will talk about the retrofit scheme. As Deputy Ó Broin said, the problem with the retrofit scheme is that it has looked after those who can afford to pay the most, so we are probably looking at some of the best houses in least need of retrofitting getting the most money from this State. It did not go to the people who needed it most. Then, at times, we have people put under severe pressure, whether we are talking about the burning of turf or any other issues. We have not dealt with the absolute price gouging that has gone on from energy firms in relation to those who are hurting the most. I do not know how many times Deputy Pa Daly and others have been in here speaking about the need to deal with standing charges and about the CRU having greater powers to address any of these issues. That is before we get into the issues of flooding and the mitigations and protections we know about because of changed circumstances. Again, this Government has dithered and taken far too long. What we need to see are real movement and supports for people because none of this is good enough. Unfortunately, it is a continuity of failure.

We have an incredible opportunity here for energy security and independence because of our massive wind resource, offshore wind in particular. We have the opportunity to democratise our energy system, give people cheaper bills and, more importantly, give them ownership of the energy system. We have the opportunity to deliver warmer homes, retrofitted homes, a public transport system that is accessible and affordable and, most importantly, the building of sustainable communities. That is what we can do and what we need to do. The Government, however, has taken an entirely different approach. It has taken the approach of targets that it has failed to meet at every hand's turn. It has taken the approach of pontification and hypocrisy, with one rule for households and another rule for data centres and large commercial enterprises. There is no greater example of that than carbon tax. It has almost come to the point that you are not serious about climate action unless you support carbon tax but let us look at the Irish carbon tax and how it is employed. New research from Trinity College Dublin published in the Energy Research & Social Science paper lays bare the deep inequity at the heart of the Irish Government's approach and the Irish carbon tax. The study finds that adoption of sustainable technologies like heat pumps, solar panels and electric vehicles is overwhelmingly concentrated in affluent areas. It says that disadvantaged communities are being left behind by rates five to seven times lower than wealthier areas. The pay-then-reimburse grant model system disproportionately benefits those who can afford high upfront costs. The Government's approach locks out renters, people living in apartments and low-income households. Instead of a just transition, we see a two-tier system where the wealthy get the supports to go green while everyone else is left to foot the bill through higher taxes. That is the reality. In effect, it is a massive transfer of wealth. Those people who are proposing and supporting a carbon tax should say if they are net beneficiaries of the carbon tax and if they are being subsidised in terms of purchase of electric vehicles or retrofitting. Have they drawn down thousands of euro in taxpayers' money while at the same time the rural dweller is left as a massive net contributor? It is a massive transfer of wealth and a deep inequity at the heart of this Government.

I welcome the opportunity to have a debate here on climate action and commend the Green Party on bringing forward this motion. The frustration for me when we have debates on climate action is that, in part, yes, the debate is framed around carbon taxes, which is one part of the overall strategy, and we have our view on whether or not it is effective, which was very clearly set out by my colleague an Teachta O'Rourke. The other is that we have a discussion about high-level targets which we never meet. Any climate action target I have ever seen this State commit to we have not met it. I do not see a sense in our continuously setting high-level targets which we cannot reach and not having a debate about how we will actually meet them or having concrete plans, Department by Department, area by area, as to what we are doing and what we can do to meet those targets. I will give one example of this in my constituency because it is really important to me and I have been out there a number of times and am a really big supporter of it. I refer to Waterford Port. Waterford Port and, indeed, Rosslare Europort in Wexford are uniquely placed to play a really strong part in offshore renewable energy. They want to do it. They have the capacity to do it. They have the ability to do it, the plans and the drive, and it would be transformative for Waterford and for the south-east region. In fact, if we want Waterford to become a zero-carbon city, then this is the game-changer. The port has submitted its landmark planning application to An Coimisiún Pleanála. It is a multimillion euro terminal that is being proposed at Belview. The Maritime Area Regulatory Authority, MARA, has granted the maritime area consent. The plans consist of a 250 m extension of the existing wharfs, land reclamation, more operational facilities, office space, a new electric substation and solar panels for enhanced solar power, so it is transformative. Here we have a port that wants to play its part. It is moving through the planning process; I get that. However, there is a concern, as with lots of these big projects, and I think this is critical, that in the final analysis it may not get the backing and the funding from the Department and Government that it needs. I want the Government to prove everybody wrong. It goes back to what I said. High-level targets are one thing. Here is a plan, a planning application and a funding ask that will come very quickly and will be transformative. The proof of the pudding will be in the eating. If we are serious about this, the Government will fund it. I want to impress upon the Minister and the Government the importance of this for Waterford and the south east. For those of us who will go out and aggressively sell the advantages of offshore renewable wind, there will be some kickback, as there always is. I will be one of those who will go out and say what we need. We need to have the backing of the Government and the Departments to make this happen when push comes to shove.

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Teachta O'Gorman agus an Comhaontas Glas as an rún den scoth seo a chur chun cinn. Tá sé tráthúil agus Lá Domhanda na Cruinne á cheiliúradh againn inniu. Tacóidh Páirtí an Lucht Oibre leis an rún. This motion provides a stark picture of just how far we have slipped and continue to slip in terms of our climate goals. I have been really struck by how little emphasis the Government has placed on our response to what is the greatest existential crisis we face not just as a country but as a planet, and it is a climate and biodiversity crisis. I was listening to the Minister of State, Deputy Christopher O'Sullivan's, comments earlier about the lack of focus on biodiversity in the Opposition. That could be not be further from the truth and I am disappointed the Minister of State is not here for this. This Government, which the Minister of State is a part of, is determined to systematically destroy biodiversity in this country by ignoring and actively disapplying environmental laws and environmental considerations when it comes to critical infrastructure. The Government is scapegoating environmental law for its own failures to deliver and undermining laws that were designed to protect our biodiversity and our natural environment. This Government wants to import hugely polluting fracked gas via a new LNG terminal. These two issues alone have huge impacts on our biodiversity and we are fighting against this in opposition all the time. This Government has also extended the nitrates directive, despite the fact that the quality of water in our waterways and lakes continues to decline. At the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Climate, Environment and Energy, which I am privileged to be a part of, we have tried to shine a light on the huge destruction of biodiversity and nature going on in various locations like Lady's Island Lake in Wexford and the Blackwater river in Cork. We have investigated the large-scale, illegal commercial extraction of peat for export and profit, destroying our bogs and peatland habitats, as well as undermining our vital carbon sinks. The committee has investigated the EU's proposal to eliminate the LIFE programme, the only dedicated fund in Europe for nature restoration and a scheme that has major positive impacts on biodiversity and nature restoration projects across Ireland. Later today, we will be looking into salmon conservation. I have not seen the Minister of State, Deputy O'Sullivan, at any of our climate committee hearings on biodiversity. As the Chief Whip said to another Deputy yesterday, you do not need to be a member of committee to attend it. We would welcome the Minister of State's input. I know he has a genuine passion for and dedication to biodiversity and nature. I would like to support him in his role but I would suggest that rather than criticising the Opposition, his efforts would be better placed in trying to ensure that our Government focuses on biodiversity issues being raised by the Opposition and regularly at the climate committee on a cross-party basis. He should ensure that the EPA, the National Parks and Wildlife Service, county councils and other institutions are resourced to effectively enforce our climate and nature laws. What we have seen from this Government over the past year and a half is climate backsliding, both in terms of our level of ambition and in terms of the actual numbers. Of course, rhetorically this Government remains committed to our climate ambitions and it recognises the importance of decarbonising our economy and our energy sector and so on, but it undermines it every day of the week. It is laid out plainly in this motion and I commend Deputy O'Gorman on putting together a compilation of this Government's willful failures, its greatest hits when it comes to climate, energy and the environment. Alarm bells have been going off more or less since day one of this Government. Let us take the removal of the 2:1 spending ratio on public transport to new roads in the programme for Government, for example. Clearly, this is a very regressive move, particularly given the positive steps that had been taken by the previous Government in the investment and roll-out of more public transport services in rural areas, the reduction in fares, etc. Transport remains the second highest emitting sector in our economy. Decarbonising it to the greatest extent possible would go a long way to helping us reach our climate goals, not to mention the associated public health and quality-of-life benefits and the improvements it could have on congestion on our roads. However, at a time when we are trying to see a modal shift away from private car use towards greener, more sustainable modes of transport like buses, rail, cycling, walking and so on, the Government's major change in policy was to pour more concrete and tar, which is just a bit depressing. Public transport projects like DART+ Southwest, projects that would have a real positive impact on people's lives, are unfortunately just getting pushed back. Even on a more local level for me and for the Minister of State, Deputy Brophy, we have heard absolutely nothing about the programme for Government commitment to carry out a new independent feasibility study for an extension of a metro out to Dublin South West. It is looking like we will finally be able to say with some degree of confidence that construction on the MetroLink will begin soon and that is very welcome, but we now need to start looking ahead and we should be looking in the direction of Dublin South West. My frustration with these delays and the Government's apparent lack of urgency in delivering these public transport projects is not purely from a climate perspective. Reliable, efficient and affordable public transport is a quality-of-life issue too, and our cities are completely gridlocked. Dublin is the third most congested city in the world and people are wasting hours of their lives sitting in traffic every day, every week. At the end of last year,Transport Infrastructure Ireland, TII, threw up the white flag on the M50, effectively saying there is nothing more it can do to address traffic congestion. A Galway bypass has recently been approved. This will be welcome in the short term but what happens when that road inevitably gets clogged with more traffic just like the M50 and every road we build? Where is the plan for the Galway Luas? Where is the plan for better buses, like the express service from Oranmore to the city centre that Councillor Helen Ogbu is pushing for? We saw the plan for the Cork Luas published last week, which is great but we need to see urgency from the Government to get it delivered. Energy is, of course, on everyone's mind at the moment. In the Labour Party we have been clear that this needs to be a moment of revolution in our energy system. What we are experiencing at present is not an energy crisis; it is a fossil fuel crisis. Many of us have been sounding the alarm about our dependence on oil and gas for years from a climate perspective, but the last number of weeks have illustrated in no uncertain terms that there are also financial costs associated with our continued dependence on oil and gas. That is aside from any fines we might get from the EU for not reaching our climate targets. Ordinary workers, households and small businesses are now paying the price for our overreliance on dirty fossil fuels. I was really glad to hear an acknowledgement from the Tánaiste yesterday morning that our dependence on fossil fuels is not sustainable, but the inertia we have seen in this area so far can no longer be tolerated. The events of the last few weeks have exposed just how scandalous it is that we have not added a single watt of energy from offshore wind to our grid in 20 years. Our most abundant renewable resource remains largely untapped offshore. We are certainly not going to reach our 2030 target, which was set in the previous programme for Government and the 2021 climate action plan of achieving 5 GW of offshore renewable capacity by 2030. The Minister is now framing that target to deliver 5 GW as being to have them under construction by 2030. That seems to be the best we can hope for. There has been no urgency to build up our renewable capacity. No great effort has been made to wean us off the fossil fuels that are not just harming our environment but causing real financial pain for workers and families up and down the country. The latest exercise in climate backsliding we have seen from this Government is an attack on our climate laws. It does not want to bother with the climate Act any more. It is just an inconvenience. Instead of addressing our infrastructure deficits, the Government is scapegoating environmental concerns and judicial reviews. There are any number of reasons that it takes time to deliver large projects here but dumping on environmentalists and environmental law is just dishonest. The Government is looking for someone or something to blame for its failure to properly resource our planning authorities, regulatory bodies and courts over the last ten years. None of the delays to the national children's hospital will be because of environmental objections. Section 15 of the climate Act is there to ensure that our public bodies account for the fact that we are living through a climate and biodiversity crisis and that the decisions we take now will determine whether things get better or worse. There are also serious constitutional questions about this move. If it is to be the case that a designation by the Minister or the Government means that a core statutory duty, such as that contained in section 15 of the climate Act, can be disapplied, there would essentially be unfettered discretion, enabling selective exemption from legislation. Such a power has already been tested in the Supreme Court, where the case for it failed. Essentially, if the Bill allows the Executive to decide which projects are critical and therefore freed from climate constraints, the Government is effectively deciding when and to whom the law applies. That is not acceptable. This Government has unfortunately shown a total disregard for our existing laws, particularly environmental provisions. I will reiterate my strong support for this motion. I could go on but I will finish by again stating that the story of this Government when it comes to climate is one of backsliding, a lack of seriousness and great rhetoric that is then undermined in practical actions. It is a story of a government without ambition on climate.

I welcome this motion and thank the Green Party for bringing it forward. I absolutely agree that the energy crisis is a climate crisis, but it is also a social justice crisis. The reason we are here and the reason so many people are at the mercy of global and international fossil fuel shocks is that this Government and the previous Government did not put in place plans to insulate communities and homeowners from these energy shocks. It is not the case that we did not have warnings previously. After the invasion of Ukraine, we saw incredible increases in the price of electricity and gas. It was at that time that the Government should have put in place measures to insulate and future-proof homes and to protect those who are least able to weather these shocks. We in the Social Democrats put out a press release in September 2022 that called for the Government to urgently ramp up investment in social energy, double grants for solar panels and give free panels to those who were eligible for the warmer homes schemes. I spoke about how not implementing proper large-scale investment in solar was a wasted opportunity. Some 1 million homes in Ireland were suitable for solar panels and should have been eligible. If the Government had listened at that time, this country would be in a much better position to weather the current shock. That was a wasted opportunity on the part of the previous Government. Only last week, the Social Democrats reiterated our calls for large-scale investment in solar so that everybody can avail of its benefits. I refer not just to those who are financially secure but also to those who rely on supports, including disability supports and fuel allowance, and those families who are working but who find it difficult to invest in future-proofing their homes because they are worried about paying rent, their mortgage or for childcare. People do not have money sitting in their bank accounts that they could use for these measures. We ask that the Government support our calls and the calls in today's motion to really invest in solar because we cannot continue to go through this cycle of energy shock followed by failing people in our communities and placing the burden on them. As it is Earth Day, I also want to talk about nature. We should not talk about climate and energy without also talking about nature. It is all inextricably linked. I have studied and worked in the area of environmental protection since I was 17. I have worked in a multitude of areas and I must say I find it very frustrating to see where we are now and how we have not used the last 30 or 40 years to protect our environment. I am really sick and tired of hearing governments say that they are supporting climate action and nature protection while doing the complete opposite. Last week in the Dáil, we debated Government-proposed measures that would undermine the climate Act, the very Act we brought in during the term of the last Dáil to protect against and mitigate the huge crisis that is the climate crisis. I am also sick and tired of seeing governments using the environment purely for photo opportunities and greenwashing exercises. I am sick and tired of the disconnect between what is spoken in here and what happens on the ground. I will give some very small illustrations of where we are going so wrong in this country. We have national parks without management plans and where nature is not prioritised. We have protected areas where there is no protection. Every year, the Minister of State responsible for biodiversity signs off on the hunting of endangered red-listed birds and other endangered and protected species. It just does not make sense. Compartmentalising nature separately from everything else that we do just does not work. Nature, climate and environment have to span every single portfolio because unless we do it that way, we are never going to get this right, we are never going to make inroads and we are going to leave people and the environment behind. If we do not get this right, the environment will continue to regenerate, but our lives, energy security, food security, mental health and ability to engage with our environment and our neighbourhoods will be heavily impacted. It is all highly linked. I ask that when the Ministers are sitting at the Cabinet table, they try to incorporate nature, the environment and climate change. It is only then that we will manage to make inroads and make the changes. We cannot separate nature from everything else. It just does not work like that.

I thank Deputy O'Gorman for proposing this motion today. It is particularly welcome because the protection of our natural world and climate action are foundational to everything else but have dropped off the political agenda to an alarming degree. Last week, near Cobh in my own constituency, constituents reported extensive hedgerow destruction during nesting season. The people who witnessed this activity were very distressed by what was happening. They reported it to the National Parks and Wildlife Service, which told them that it had no staff to send out to investigate. They also reported it to An Garda Síochána but no intervention followed. I appealed to the Minister of State, Deputy Christopher O'Sullivan, to redeploy NPWS staff from outside east Cork. I appreciate him doing so in a timely fashion. It was also appreciated by local residents. However, this episode really highlights the absolute gutting of NPWS resources in east Cork for years now, which has left the region entirely exposed as regards the enforcement of wildlife protection provisions. As I have raised here previously, it is incredible that east Cork has not had a ranger for 12 of the last 15 years. It has also had no district conservation officer for close to two years and there has been no regional manager over east Cork and Waterford for years. We are now in the extraordinary position whereby if something serious happens in east Cork, such as the destruction of hedgerows or habitats, staff have to be deployed from outside of the region, which only happened in this case following an appeal to a Minister, because the NPWS in the region is so overstretched. As happened in Cobh, all too often immense damage will already have been done by the time there is any investigation. Hedgerows are vital habitats. They are nesting sites, wildlife corridors and part of the ecological fabric of rural communities. They also help with the retention of excess rainfall, thereby contributing to flood mitigation. When I previously looked into whether there had been efforts to recruit for these long-vacant positions in east Cork, the responses I received from the Minister of State, Deputy O'Sullivan's, Department were so opaque as to be insulting. This really needs to be prioritised for east Cork.

According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, global temperatures have already risen by 1.1°C above pre-industrial levels and it is increasingly likely that they will exceed 1.5 °C within the next decade without rapid emission cuts. The United Nations environmental programme estimates that around 1 million species are at risk of extinction, largely due to human activity. In 2019, Dáil Éireann declared a climate and biodiversity emergency, becoming the second country in the world to do that. However, there are targets to meet under the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Act 2015 and Ireland's fourth national biodiversity action plan. There are loads of action plans with all of these targets set out but if we do not meet them, we are off track and we will have a seriously detrimental effect on our future. The Environmental Protection Agency reported in May 2025 that even with all the planned policies, Ireland is off track for its 2030 climate goals, with only a 23% reduction in emissions expected. Despite growing awareness, data from a global survey done by UNESCO showed that 70% of young people surveyed could not explain exactly what climate change is or explain it very well. While climate change spans many subjects in schools, we need a dedicated subject. However, it is not only for young people in schools but for all of us - individuals trying to offset problems caused by industry and external factors outside this country. These are tiny things, drops in the ocean. As a city TD, I have to say that nature, biodiversity and all of those things are so vital. We are very vulnerable to pollution, both in the future and now.

As Deputy Cummins said, Ireland declared a climate and biodiversity emergency back in 2019. This motion aims to renew that because absolutely nothing has happened. It is a bit like St. Augustine when he said, "Grant me chastity and continence, Lord, but not yet". We talk the talk, but we never walk the climate action walk, and that is a depressing fact. I do not have time in two minutes to talk about biodiversity but my statements on biodiversity were made quite recently and are on the Dáil record. However, I do want to talk about our overall approach to climate action. It is a pity that there are no Sinn Féin Ddeputies in the House because Shinners speak with forked tongues when it comes to climate and carbon taxes. No one likes a carbon tax, and obviously in the context of the fuel emergency right now we need to give short-term measures to people, but the concept of a carbon tax is accepted worldwide. It is the implementation of it that is the issue. Some of our Sinn Féin colleagues mentioned that it does not necessarily help rural Ireland enough and that the current implementation of it does not help poorer families, that it disproportionately helps those who are better off. However, the principle of a climate tax actually makes sense to discourage the use of fossil fuels and encourage people to move towards alternatives. This is where we get to the point that we do not have those alternatives. There has been underinvestment in public transport and the grid to allow us to be self-sufficient and self-reliant in energy and have EVs powered solely by Ireland. We have done nothing about tidal or wave power. We are gradually getting towards offshore wind power and have done very little about solar power either. We are way behind in terms of meeting our 2030 obligations and have to wake up and smell the coffee. We might be making a small net contribution to climate change, but we are disproportionate in terms of population and we have a responsibility towards Ireland and the world.

Today, on Earth Day, I raise the very important issue of our pollinators. Our native Irish bees are in significant jeopardy as a result of the importation of foreign bees. The importation during the Covid-19 years increased by fivefold. Studies have shown that the rate of hybridisation in Irish colonies has increased by almost 300% over the past six years. That means our native Irish black honey bees are mating with other bees in the area. Beekeepers obviously cannot control that. They are mating and the result is a hybridisation effect. If we allow this importation to continue, particularly of yellow bees, there is a very significant risk that we are going to see the extinction of our native genetic strain of bees. This is a very important issue and there have been calls by the Native Irish Honey Bee Society to enact the Protection of the Native Irish Honey Bee Bill 2021. We had the association before the Oireachtas committee recently and we heard about the devastating effects of hybridisation. I am calling on the Minister of State to do something. The Bill passed Second Stage in the previous Dáil. It is really important that we see the passing of that Bill to protect our own bees, pollination and biodiversity in the country. I also want to raise the climate fines this country is facing. The climate advisory council and Irish Fiscal Advisory Council, IFAC, outlined and warned the Government that we could face up to €26 billion in climate fines as a result of the previous Government signing very ambitious targets. Will the Minister of State outline on the floor of the Dáil what fines we are expected to face as a country as a result of these climate action targets?

We have been a long time talking about targets in this House and we are way off our game. To be honest, I have spoken quite a lot about Barryroe oil field and fossil fuels since I came into the Dáil, and I often got Deputies sitting to my right screaming and roaring back at me. After the past two weeks, they now know that we cannot do without fossil fuels. Common sense has prevailed. In fairness, I will be honest that I need education as well. There is no point in me just shouting that fossil fuels are the way forward and moving on. That is ridiculous too, but I always felt that Barryroe should have been explored because it could have been a chance to fund renewables, the renewables that we promised this nation when I came into the Dáil ten years ago and that have not been delivered. It is the only way forward. We should sit down and put together a cross-party group of people with maybe extreme views on every side, as long as they would not be getting overly angry with each other, to see if they could come to a consensus in the middle because there is a middle ground there somewhere. We do have to look after the environment, and I am big into that. However, it should not come at a price and it is coming at a huge price to the people of rural Ireland with the carbon tax. Carbon tax hits rural people 99% more than anybody else. Those are the facts. People can be in denial and they can say this or that. We know the mindset within Fine Gael. Leo Varadkar, the former leader of Fine Gael, has proven it this week when he decimated rural people and agriculture. It was an absolute disgrace. That was his mindset the whole time and he is now coming clean. He did not say that when he was below at the ploughing championships. He did not say that when he was canvassing around rural places. He told us we were great people. We now find out that Fine Gael does not like farmers or rural people at all. The Minister of State should read his statement. It was not good enough.

Leo Varadkar does not speak for Fine Gael.

He should at least apologise to the people of this country because he hurt people, and he does not need to do that. He is a former leader. He needs to advise maybe and not attack the ordinary people. There are over 300,000 people in energy poverty. How can we create a solution to this? Is it solar panels? The Green Party had to take the hit on this big time because it was in government. To run a home on solar power, and I have talked to experts about this, homeowners need up to €20,000 and they get a grant of €1,800. That is a pittance. The Government needs to encourage people to put solar panels up on sheds, on the roofs of houses and maybe on lawns. It needs to encourage people away from having to use electricity towards using their own power. That was where the Green Party should have come in and it failed to do all this. All it wanted to do was apply the carbon tax so it could double the number of cycleways up and down the country. I was canvassing in Galway last week with Councillor Noel Thomas. The people of that community were furious. Hundreds of households, not just one or two, asked why were there double cycleways. I agree we need a single cycleway and a single walkway, but the carbon tax is being used and abused as a tax to put forward fancy projects. It is the same as greenways, where people are saying their land is being stolen from them. These are hard-working farmers who do not want to give their land to have miles and miles of black tar put down through the middle of it. It is insane. It is time to stop these fancy silly projects and put the money back into the country. I am willing to sit down with the Green Party, and have no problem in doing so, because some of its ideas are very good. We need to marry them with the people who might be on the other side and have concerns. We have concerns about vehicles at the moment. I put forward a proposal to the Taoiseach two weeks ago about a battery operated lorry, something people thought I would not do, but the Taoiseach did not answer. The proposal was to carry out a pilot project in west Cork, because I know a person who wants to do it. Such lorries work in New Zealand and Japan, but Ireland will wait for 20 years before we will consider such vehicles because we might put forward something ahead of the rest of Europe and wake up to the realities of what is out there. This is where we are going. We need to sit around the table. On public transport, Local Link has done some wonderful work for a couple of years. Over the past eight or nine months, it has had tenders and has told us there is no money to run bus operations. The Minister of State, Deputy Canney, told people to walk to work, cycle and take a bus. That is nonsense for most people who cannot do that. It annoyed people and that resulted in the protests at the present time. I congratulate Damien Long, who bought the Viaduct bar and, it is to be hoped, will make something like we are used to at exits 14 and 9 in west Cork. It will be a park-and-ride system. There is no train for 18 miles in west Cork. In the next 12 months, we hope, people can go to the Viaduct and get a bus to Dublin. I want a such a service. All of my neighbours and friends want to leave Mizen Head and the Beara and Sheep's Head Peninsulas and get a bus that will take them to a train. We certainly cannot get a train. We had it, but we blew it in the 1950s. There is no point in going back over that. There are also delays in retrofitting, which needs to be looked into. Progressive politicians need to have a cross-party alliance, whether that is the Green Party or any other party. We all need to sit around the table and toss out the solutions. Let us consider buses that can be battery operated. We need to look at solutions and work on them to ensure we do not end up being laggards like we are.

Happy Earth Day, with thanks to Deputy O'Gorman. I want to begin with solar, including plug-in solar. People always say that this Oireachtas has one of the highest numbers of Gaeilgeoirí, which it does. It also has one of the highest numbers of beekeepers, including me, Deputy Paul Lawless and Senator PJ Murphy. Bees are one of the most fascinating creatures in Ireland. They feature in our Brehon laws. There used to be the tradition of telling the bees, where you would tell your bees about the passing of a loved one. They were intrinsically linked with our history, but they need our help. I welcome the work of Deputy Lawless and Senator Murphy with the native Irish bee Bill. As a Dub, I raised this issue at my first ever meeting of the agriculture committee in respect of how we need to work in conjunction with the North on the Bill. We are not importing bees but if they go through Belfast Port, there is no point in legislation. We need to protect native Irish bees. I have nine colonies and they teach you a lot. We need a quick and decisive decision to help people with solar. There is strong public demand for solar panels across my constituency. I have referred to how apartment dwellers are blocked from being able to avail of reduced energy bills due to the fact that they do not have access to rooftops. The UK Government is fast-tracking this at the moment. The German Government has introduced a policy. All that is needed is a 500 W or 800 W solar panel on a balcony with an inverter plugged into a socket. People could use a battery in conjunction with that to help with the cost. I hope this will be looked into. I raised this issue on a previous occasion and concerns were raised about the danger of plug-in solar. I am aware that without proper execution there is a possibility that if people used two 500 W or 800 W panels on a single extension lead plugged into a single socket, there could be risk of fire. We could have a government scheme to make sure my proposal is implemented properly. That would reduce bills immediately and if we introduced a grant, the payback period could be reduced and people could be helped immediately. Multiple studies have showed that, in conjunction with small scale batteries, solar panels can help people who are struggling with costs right now. I welcome the work done by the SEAI and the Minister, Deputy O'Brien. Local authorities can also access support for energy upgrades. While canvassing across my area, I have found there is sometimes a delay. We need to investigate how tenants can avail of cheaper solar panels for terraced houses. If work was done at one time, that would reduce the installation fee. People have also raised concerns with me regarding installation quotes, which can vary hugely. People want to know that they are getting fair value and want transparency and confidence. For anyone who is not familiar with plug-in solar, I have established what it involves. I welcome the comments of the Minister that it is under consideration. It would be a simple fix to help the people I represent. On batteries and smart meters, home batteries make solar more useful. Instead of using the low value of electricity produced during the day and losing it, people can hold it and use it when they need it most. Smart meters are helping and allow people to understand their usage more accurately through their smart phones with a direct link. The CRU has also made it clear that smart services require customer permission to access data, which is important for public trust. If used properly, smart meters can really help. The private wires Bill is being developed and will address barriers for EV uptake in Dublin. Many people do not have a driveway and live on terraced streets, apartments or homes. I will push for the Bill, one of the goals of which is to facilitate on-street parking. I would like to finish with bees. Ireland has 98 species.. Some 77% comprise solidarity, which nest in the ground. We have white tailed and buff tailed bumblebees, which are lovely insects. I look forward to working with Senator Murphy and Deputy Lawless. Regarding another nature-based solution, in Dublin the Green Ocean Foundation has installed oyster farms across Dún Laoghaire and Howth. I hope the Government will consider expanding the scheme. Oysters are filter feeders and a single oyster can filter hundreds of litres of seawater a day. In doing so, they improve water quality on a local scale and help the cycle of nutrients. Oyster reefs are used in productive and shallow coastal habitats and can encourage biodiversity. We need to work in conjunction with nature for nature-based solutions, be it pollution or coastal erosion. When oyster beds clean water, they also encourage sea life, and that encourages a reef, which reduces coastal erosion.

I am glad to get the opportunity to speak here today. I believe the climate change, but I do not agree with others about what is causing the change. Climate has changed dramatically over the centuries and decades. In the 1740s, Ireland went through a desperate famine and we lost a third of our population due to hunger, cold and rain. People could not save turf, had no hay for their cows and cattle starved over the winter. The country was burned out of it for 100 years in the 13th or 14th century. In the 1890s, there were floods in places like Gneeveguilla, where a bog was washed into the Lakes of Killarney 12 miles away. In a field in the Clydagh Valley, 11 men were washed down the river by a flood that affected the lads in Ballynavenooragh, Fenit west or something. I do not agree we on this earth can change the weather in any way. What is going on is costing us an awful lot of money. The road in Fossa, a national primary road going back to Killorglin and around the Ring of Kerry, was narrowed and there are now footpaths and a cycleway on both sides beside the carriageway. Buses and lorries have to pass each other going east and west. Our rivers are not being cleaned. We are waiting for assessments, reports and this and that. The Flesk river flooded in 2022, which affected the national primary road to Cork outside of Glenflesk. I went through it in late 2015 or early 2016 and I thought I would not get home that night because I did not know where the road finished. The water was 3 ft over the road and there is a 10 ft drop at the side. After several requests and deputations by me and many others, the Minister of State, Deputy Kevin Boxer Moran, cleared the river. He gave us a small bit of money and we were allowed to clear the river. The road has not flooded since. Those are the facts, whether the Minister of State likes them or wants to hear them or not. We are losing a lot of lives on roads. People are very hurt over that. A lot of pedestrians are being killed along local roads because the hedges are not cut. People are not allowed to cut them in the summer when the hedges have gone mad. Pedestrians are walking outside the yellow line because they are afraid their eyes would be picked out along the ditch, and then they get hit by motorcars or whatever. During the last protest, the Minister of State, Deputy Canney, told us that we must walk and cycle more. That is hurtful to people who have a time limit to get to work. People have to drop off children to school and do 100 different other things. To tell them to go cycling or walking is absolutely ridiculous. The last thing I will mention is the carbon tax, which I never voted for in this Chamber and never will. A great case was made at an IFA meeting last week by a sound farmer. He questioned why they should be paying carbon tax when they are sequestering carbon. They have hedges and ditches and when they are growing grass, carbon is being sequestered. That is the God’s gospel truth. Every farmer is complying and putting AdBlue into his tractor, jeep or whatever vehicle it is but he or she is still made to pay carbon tax. Those are the points the Government needs to address. It is not fair, especially on farmers because they sequester more carbon than they generate. I ask the Government to look at that. In October I certainly could not vote to allow the Government to extend reducing the carbon tax to 2030. It does not make any sense. The Government states that the carbon tax goes towards retrofitting but many people are refused the retrofit grant.

I thank Deputies from across the House for their contributions to this debate. Obviously, as we have heard, the strength of feeling on this issue is evident. Having sat through this debate, a range of views have been expressed. The Government welcomes the engagement. There are serious issues that require serious and sustained action. It is important to address some of the points raised during the debate. First, I will speak to the contribution we had on bees. As Deputy Heneghan will know, I am the Minister of State in the Department of justice, and we in the Department of justice are beekeepers as well. We have our own bees on the roof of the Department, which contributes to the excellent work the Deputy does with his beekeeping. Our honey is very badly called - excuse the pun - “Just Honey”. There you go. There have been claims that Ireland is not making progress on climate action but the facts demonstrate otherwise. The Environmental Protection Agency’s most recent reporting confirms overall greenhouse gas, GHG, emission reductions for a third consecutive year. Furthermore, Ireland now has the lowest level of GHG emissions in 35 years. That progress has been achieved while the population, housing stock and economy continue to grow. It has been suggested that the Government is failing to protect vulnerable households from recent fuel price pressure. Again, that is not correct. We have introduced one of the most comprehensive responses in the European Union, including the recent €505 million package of practical measures. This included further reductions in excise on petrol, diesel and marked gas oil, along with the deferral of the planned carbon tax increase. This is in addition to the previously allocated €250 million in targeted supports to assist those experiencing immediate financial pressure. It is important to note that budget 2026 also provided a record €640 million for home energy upgrades, including €340 million for the warmer home scheme which provides fully funded upgrades for households experiencing energy poverty. Additional supports also remain available through the fuel allowance and additional needs payments. We are also undergoing a renewable-led transformation on our energy system. Renewable electricity generation has increased five-fold since 2005. Ireland has now reached approximately 8 GW of renewable generation capacity while wind energy supplied a record 50% of the State’s electricity in February 2026. The Government is prioritising offshore wind, with five phase 1 projects progressing through the planning system alongside an unprecedented €18.9 billion investment into the electricity grid. Significant progress is also being made on biodiversity. The fourth national biodiversity action plan is now in place on a statutory footing and promotes a whole-of-government approach. The €25 million Marine Protected Areas LIFE Ireland project supports the delivery of marine protected areas through public participation and codesign. There have been claims that funding for farmers to implement the national biodiversity action plan is inadequate. In reality, farmers are supported by a multilayered funding system, including the €1.5 billion ACRES. In respect of data centres, the Government’s position has been clear. We will focus on sustainable development of strategically significant energy-intensive industries, including data centres, through the Large Energy-User Action Plan published only this year and in alignment with Ireland’s broader Government objectives. We will continue to focus our efforts on supports for families and businesses in need through our national energy affordability task force. The Government fully agrees with the need for climate ambition, biodiversity restoration and support for households. Where we disagree is with a motion that restates commitments already contained in law and that does not reflect the established statutory and parliamentary processes or acknowledge the substantial work already under way across government. The legally binding target of a 51% reduction in emissions by 2030 is already provided for in law under the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Act. In respect of the removal of certain provisions in the proposed legislation, it is a matter for the Oireachtas through the established legislative process to scrutinise proposed legislation as it progresses through the various Stages. The Government’s countermotion more accurately reflects the reality of the position. It affirms our climate ambition across all sectors, recognises the need to protect households and businesses from energy pressures, notes the progress already being delivered and supports a practical, balanced and deliverable pathway forward. This Government is taking decisive action to reduce emissions, expand renewable energy, protect nature and support households through the transition. We have the plans with the legislative frameworks and the investment in place to continue that progress. I conclude by thanking the Deputies across the House for their contributions today. However, as indicated by my colleague, I do not accept the motion before the House and I present the Government’s countermotion in its place.

I thank Deputies for their contributions to this debate, particularly those Deputies who indicated their support for my motion. In the effort to try to find a bit of common ground among Deputies who disagreed, I was delighted to hear Deputy Michael Collins speak about supporting one of his constituents who is trying to move transport and heavy goods vehicles, HGVs, onto a battery source. I recommend the Deputy look at the zero-emission heavy duty vehicle purchase grant scheme that is in place. In my time as Minister, I had the opportunity to take part in the launch of a number of heavy-duty vehicles being done by ATC Computer Transport and Logistics. It turned approximately 10% of a large heavy-duty vehicle fleet to electric vehicles. It can be done. I am delighted to see Deputy Collins advocating for that in his constituency. I am afraid my efforts to find common ground cannot extend quite as far as aligning myself with Deputy Danny Healy-Rae’s version of history and science. There is only so much we can do in one day. I thank the Minister of State for his contribution. I am disappointed the Government is not prepared to accept the motion the Green Party has put forward and is instead tabling a countermotion, which frankly refuses to acknowledge the very real setback in climate action we have seen under this Government. There is serious denial on the Government benches around the scale of the challenges we face in Ireland. The attitude is that the foot can be taken off the pedal now that it does not have to deal with the Green Party at the Cabinet table. At the very centre of this Government approach is the unambiguous statement by the Minister for climate and energy that Ireland will miss its 2030 emissions targets by half and the fact he has provided no emergency plan to seek to address that or reverse that trajectory. The climate consequences of that failure, of not reaching these targets, will have very real consequences for our economy as well. The Irish Fiscal Advisory Council and the Climate Change Advisory Council published a joint paper indicating the costs for Ireland as a potential range of €8 billion to €26 billion in compliance costs for missing climate targets. Even if we took the lowest end of that range, €8 billion, out of our budget in a year, that is a surplus wiped out. The comfort we enjoy now in terms of being able to deal with emergencies - for example, Covid, the Ukraine war and responding to the Iran war - that is being put at risk by our country's and our Government's failures to take the actions that will avoid these fines. What is particularly infuriating is that on this issue the Government is waving the white flag four years before the target deadlines come in. I do not know of any other targets set by the Government where it would be seen as acceptable for the Government to give up four years in advance. What the Government needs to do now is rapidly publish a climate action plan, fully align it to next carbon budget cycle and set out the additional measures, new measures and extra measures that will get Ireland back on track for our 2030 targets. In his speech earlier, the Minister of State, Deputy O'Sullivan, had a bit of a go at me because I did not reference nature and biodiversity in my initial ten-minute speech. Funnily enough, I was going to give him a little compliment in terms of a bit of good news yesterday in the context of his Department. Yesterday, my colleague, Senator Malcolm Noonan, recognised it was World Curlew Day. That was celebrated because we are finally seeing some breeding pairs come back to various parts of Ireland led by the NPWS. I was going to acknowledge the Minister of State's role in that. However, if he is not giving any space, I am not going to give it either. That good news is reflected at a time when we also know there is a major crisis in terms of migratory birds. The number of migratory birds coming to Ireland has decreased rapidly in the past 30 years. A number of species have been particularly impacted. I suggest to the Minister of State, Deputy O'Sullivan, that rather than taking cheap digs that he looks at what he is not doing in his Department and looks at funding for farmers and nature-based solutions. That is funding had been put aside in the Climate and Nature Fund. There was €3.15 billion to deal with these kinds of issues and particularly to provide funding to farmers. We must recognise that if we are going to ask farmers to take nature-based solutions on their land, we have to pay them for that. We have to ensure new income streams are being provided. That money is gone because the Climate and Nature Fund was raided. Some €700 million of that, which was available to fund nature-based solutions that would have had a huge impact on biodiversity in our country, is not available anymore. That should be the focus of the Minister of State's work. This House declared a climate and biodiversity emergency in 2019. I wish to emphasise the word "emergency". It was more than justified when we consider the scale of the risk to every person that climate change and biodiversity loss poses. In declaring an emergency, this House also took on the responsibility to respond to that emergency with action. The previous Government - the Government I was part of - took that responsibility seriously. We implemented ambitious targets. We passed the landmark climate Act. We funded the infrastructure we need to make that transition to a net zero economy. The Government is not treating this emergency with the seriousness it deserves, and worse, it is undermining the very mechanisms that have been put in place and that will allow us as a society to respond. No amount of hand waving away, in the context of the amendments to the motion, can change the fact the Government is undermining the climate action Act, defunding public transport and giving up on climate and biodiversity targets. In tackling an emergency, sometimes the scale of the problem seems so large that it is difficult to make it tangible and make it real in the context of daily lives. However, this is not one of these times because the madness that we are seeing in the Middle East has made the climate emergency all too real for every one of us in Ireland. The energy crisis we face is a fossil fuels crisis. Many of us grew up hearing about the oil price crises of 1973 and 1979. Now, our generation is experiencing the second energy price crisis in four years. It is the second caused by a war in another part of the world and the second caused by the whims of an unstable political leader. We can free ourselves from the position of vulnerability we are in. There is only one viable long-term solution to avoid these energy shocks and that is for Ireland to produce its own abundant renewable energy on our own terms. However, there is a lack of urgency and a lack of determination to address these challenges at pace by this Government. This lack of belief is translated into a failure to be able to convincingly make the case for this transition to the Irish people. Now, too often we see the opposite. We see an effort to scapegoat climate action for wider difficulties in the delivery of infrastructure. I wish to conclude on the message that change in how we power our economy and our society can happen. Our European partners have shown that it can be delivered at speed and the benefits that accrue to the populations of those countries. This evening, the Green Party will join with other political parties and civil society groups outside the gates of Leinster House to remind the Government, which seeks to vote this motion down, that Ireland needs real climate action. The energy crisis is a consequence of the climate emergency. It is time for the Government to act. Let us establish our energy independence. Let us protect Irish households from high fuel bills into the future. Let us take that huge step towards meeting our climate and biodiversity targets.

In accordance with Standing Order 85(2), the division is deferred until tonight's voting block.