2026-04-16

11. Deputy Roderic O'Gorman asked the Minister for Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation to outline the rationale for section 7 of the Critical Infrastructure Bill 2026; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [27626/26]

17. Deputy Réada Cronin asked the Minister for Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform and Digitalisation the reason for the disapplication of section 15 of Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Act 2015 to a relevant public body as part of the Critical Infrastructure Bill 2026; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [27646/26]

I want to ask the Minister, Deputy Chambers, about his intentions through the Critical Infrastructure Bill, particularly section 7, in terms of the removal of the climate duty, a duty on all public bodies to assess the climate impact of infrastructure projects they are advancing.

I propose to take Questions Nos. 11 and 17 together. The Critical Infrastructure Bill is a central pillar of the Government’s broader infrastructure acceleration agenda. The need for a Bill to fast track a limited number of strategically important projects through approval processes was identified in a report and action plan published last December. The Bill has been drafted and introduced on a priority basis. Its primary aim is to allow the Government to designate certain projects or programmes as critical. This then requires all public bodies that may have an authorisation function for these projects or programmes to prioritise consideration of them within their approval processes. In practical terms, this means that relevant bodies will be required to prioritise, avoid delay, reduce timelines, parallel processes and co-operate to fast-track designated infrastructure. I have proposed to disapply section 15 of the climate Act because of the risk of delays that this section gives rise to. The provisions in section 15 of the Act have opened up a new channel for the judicial review of the decisions of public bodies. The net effect is that it could slow the pace of infrastructural development. Delays to infrastructure roll-out are a key reason we are not reaching much of our climate and renewable energy targets. The report by Mario Draghi on EU competitiveness, for example, specifically identified Ireland as having the slowest approval process across the EU for renewable electricity. Designated projects or programmes will still have all relevant climate considerations built into their development. Every Exchequer-funded project, for example, is already required to measure and price its greenhouse gas emissions under the infrastructure guidelines. Under the Bill as drafted, climate and environmental obligations will still fully apply. That is important to state because that is not being reflected in what the Deputy has said so far. Disapplication of section 15 simply removes an unnecessary layer that risks driving judicial reviews, and we need to remove all risks around judicial reviews in the legislative framework when it comes to infrastructure delivery. Ireland will still be bound by climate and renewable energy targets. That is part of the Government's wider work to transition to a climate-resilient, biodiversity-rich and sustainable climate-neutral economy by 2050. All that will change in practical terms is the ability to challenge decisions of public bodies as they relate to how they have considered the impact of an individual project or programme against that particular section of legislation.

Mario Draghi may have rightfully highlighted real challenges in our planning system but I do not think he placed the blame on the climate action Act or section 15. As I said in the Chamber on Tuesday, we are talking in a context where the previous Government signed up to legally binding international and European targets but the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, announced over Christmas that we would not reach those targets. The climate Act was central to our ability as a state to reach those targets and now the Government is systematically trying to take out one of the central elements, the climate duty under section 15. It has been systematic. It is seen in this legislation, it is seen in the airport cap and it is in the strategic gas Bill. I asked the Minister to name the judicial review cases taken on the basis of section 15. Can he name cases that have been taken on the basis of section 15?

I have read judgments that relate to section 15 and some of them do have a chilling effect on infrastructure delivery. I am not going to set out the judgment here - I do not have it in front of me - but I have concern with how the interpretation of section 15 as it relates to the infrastructure system presents a risk in overall delivery. There have been a number of judgments relating to section 15 that present risks, and I need to be clear about that. The deference to creating a legal avenue and risk to infrastructure delivery relating to section 15 has to be addressed in the context of delivery. To take the most recent example, last week we had a permission validly given by An Coimisiún Pleanála relating to the ring road in Galway and we already have a particular NGO saying it is considering a case under section 15 for that particular infrastructure project. It has already gone through all of the statutory processes and has already gone to An Coimisiún Pleanála. The growth, the deference and the risk of all of these projects ending up in the courts bring a risk to infrastructure delivery. There is a whole other extensive area of reforms that we are doing and we are trying to make it more efficient, but a lot of what we are trying to do here relates to building a low-carbon economy in terms of our grid, which has to be developed, and many of our transport projects, which are actually in public transport. We want to derisk appeals that are taking through judicial reviews. This is one element of it. Others relate to the work that the Minister, Deputy O'Callaghan, is doing and the work that the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, is doing around environmental legal fees as well. The judgment that was set out and the test that is given around that judgment presents risk and that is why are seeking to disapply section 15.

The Minister continually puts the blame for judicial reviews on environmentalists and on people who are concerned about climate action but let me cite three actual judicial review cases. Not the hypothetical ones that the Minister continues to cite, but actual cases that took place on three major public transport projects. There was the judicial review on DART+ West in our constituency that was taken by a landowner. There was the judicial review on the BusConnects project to Blanchardstown in our constituency that was taken by a landowner. There was the judicial review taken against the Luas Finglas project that was again taken by a landowner. In each of those cases, section 15 of the climate Act, which the Minister wants to disapply, would actually have strengthened the case of the National Transport Authority, NTA, the State agency looking to take the particular project, just as section 15 strengthened the case of An Bord Pleanála in the Coolglass case. The Minister is getting this wrong. He is not looking at the implication of what he is going to do. The Minister should read the Coolglass judgment and understand that he is weakening the State's hand in defending judicial review cases on major projects that will actually help reduce our carbon emissions.

I am against all judicial reviews whether it is environmentalists, landowners or anybody in the economy. When a decision is made by An Coimisiún Pleanála, we need to allow it to be built and respected. We have seen the enormous deference to allowing this system and industry of judicial reviews to build up. It is undermining delivery systems right across the board. I am against landowners taking judicial reviews, I am against developers taking judicial reviews, I am against anybody taking judicial reviews, but I respect the statutory process and appeals systems that we have. What we are trying to do is remove the risk of a particular legal avenue that is there. That is what I am saying. I have a similar view on anybody who wants to take a judicial review. I just gave last week's example because it happened to refer to section 15 and how it related to an infrastructure project that we wanted to deliver as a Government. I have read the judgment, and it sets out a particular test relating to individual projects, which present risks. Public bodies should and do climate assess projects. That is set out in the infrastructure guidelines. We need ensure that continues and there is no change to that in the context of publicly funded projects. We should allow public bodies to do that and adhere to the infrastructure guidelines. They already set that out in a transparent way and do it properly. At the end of all that and when a particular project has received permission, we should not present a legal risk to that project being delayed for two or three years. That is something that all of us need to address in the context of reform. Section 15 brings that risk in terms of overall delivery. On the Deputy's point, I get frustrated with anybody taking a judicial review on any project we want to deliver. The Deputy and I share the same views around ensuring DART+ West and many other public transport projects can advance.