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Cabinet Committee Meetings

Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 15 October 2019

Tuesday, 15 October 2019

Questions (9, 10, 11, 12, 13)

Eamon Ryan

Question:

9. Deputy Eamon Ryan asked the Taoiseach when the Cabinet committee on the environment last met. [38503/19]

View answer

Ruth Coppinger

Question:

10. Deputy Ruth Coppinger asked the Taoiseach when the Cabinet committee on the environment will next meet. [38543/19]

View answer

Richard Boyd Barrett

Question:

11. Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett asked the Taoiseach when the next meeting of the Cabinet committee on the environment is due to meet. [39636/19]

View answer

Joan Burton

Question:

12. Deputy Joan Burton asked the Taoiseach when the next meeting of the Cabinet committee on the environment is due to meet. [39683/19]

View answer

Brendan Howlin

Question:

13. Deputy Brendan Howlin asked the Taoiseach when the Cabinet committee on the environment last met. [41978/19]

View answer

Oral answers (24 contributions)

I propose to take Questions Nos. 9 to 13, inclusive, together.

In July, the Government decided to reorganise the Cabinet committee structures. This included the establishment of a new Cabinet committee on the environment. The Cabinet committee on the environment covers issues relating to the environment, including climate action and the implementation of the Government’s climate action plan.

Political and popular momentum for necessary climate action is growing and Government is listening. This was reflected in the Government’s publication of the cross-sectoral climate action plan in June 2019 and the strong focus on climate and environmental matters in budget 2020. Given the cross-cutting nature of the climate action plan that affects all aspects of the economy and society, the need for an all-of-Government approach to climate action is obvious. This includes a deliberate and sustained focus by all relevant Ministers and Departments. The work of the Cabinet committee on the environment is an important part of this. The committee met for the first time on 30 September 2019 and is due to meet again at least once more before the year end. At its first meeting, it discussed the first progress report on the climate action plan, which will be published in the next few weeks.

The Taoiseach is not exactly acting as if his house is on fire given that the committee is due to meet only once before the end of the year. Apart from the increase in the carbon tax, which the Government levied across the board on all workers and the disabled and which is, therefore, regressive, what real measures has the Government taken to deal with the biggest crisis facing the planet?

I want to give the Taoiseach a short anecdote. Yesterday, I drove my daughter to the bus stop to get a bus to school because the rain was so heavy. Along the way, I saw dozens of schoolchildren and workers waiting at every single bus stop. In the 15 minutes that my daughter waited no bus arrived, but that is another story. This drove home to me the futility of introducing a carbon tax when people do not have an alternative means of getting to and from school or work. There has been no alternative investment in public transport. Blanchardstown is a large suburb of the capital city where a large number of multinational companies are located. Every day, 30,000 people drive in and out of the area as they come and go to work, yet the transport system is creaking at the seams. The Government has not brought forward a proposal for a Luas line running from, say, Broombridge to Blanchardstown. That would cost €400 million-----

The Deputy's time is up.

I will finish on this.

We will not get time for an answer.

Will the Cabinet consider free public transport, which has been pioneered in many cities and in Luxembourg?

Each person produces 13.3 tonnes of carbon. An increase of €6 per tonne in carbon tax means each person will pay approximately €80 extra. For an average family of three, the regressive impact of the carbon tax amounts to approximately €240. This is more of the unfair, regressive and dishonest approach to dealing with the climate emergency. How are people supposed to retrofit their home if they live in a council house? They cannot do so because they are not allowed to do so. As such, how are these people supposed to reduce their energy bills? They have to wait for the local authority to do the retrofit. In my area, the local authority is retrofitting approximately 2% of the housing stock each year. How is someone supposed to use more public transport when we have some of the lowest subsidies for public transport anywhere in Europe and, as Deputy Coppinger pointed out, which is true in my area also, people cannot get a bus in the morning because there are not enough buses in the fleet? Where is the additional money to add an extra few hundred buses to the fleet? Where is the money to reduce fares? Did the Taoiseach ever see pensioners who have free travel? They use public transport more because it is free. If the Government wants to get people out of their cars and on to public transport, it should make public transport free. We have had none of those measures. We have only had a punitive carbon tax that is regressive and hitting the poor.

Why was no specific mention made in the budget of improving air quality and reducing the incidence of asthma, both in our big cities and smaller towns? In particular, the budget did not provide any measures to improve air quality overall. I do not believe the terms "forestry" and "trees" were mentioned in the budget documentation. Anyone who is interested in carbon reduction knows that planting trees, whether in cities or on agricultural lands, is critical to reducing our carbon impact.

Month after month, the Government promised it would stop imports of smoky coal, which my party agreed when we were in government and passed the relevant legislation. I presume the fact that the Taoiseach's party is in hock to some of the big coal merchants is the reason the Government does not want to improve air quality in towns like Enniscorthy, which is covered in fog due to the burning of smoky coal. I am concerned that, coming up to the budget, the Government did not make any concrete plans to improve air quality.

We heard nothing in the budget about extra train carriages or the electrification of the railway line to Maynooth-----

The Deputy must conclude.

-----which would get thousands of people out of their cars.

I appreciate the Taoiseach's response in respect of bilateral engagements with London on the Good Friday Agreement. I remind him that the agreement is an internationally binding treaty and caution him not to be drawn into negotiating or undermining any aspect of it. If my information is correct, he is discussing and negotiating these matters directly. His fingerprints will, therefore, be on whatever the outcome is, which I can only hope will be positive.

I do not know if the Taoiseach is aware that earlier this year, wheelchair users in Waterford raised accessibility concerns regarding the new single-deck public buses introduced into the fleet. As a result of their campaigning, the National Transport Authority, NTA, agreed a review process with the Irish Wheelchair Association. That process has now concluded. The gist of its finding is that the current design of the new buses is inadequate for those using powered wheelchairs and those with limited dexterity when manoeuvring chairs within confined spaces. As the Head of Government who cites infrastructure and public transport developments as one of the key mitigation measures in respect of the climate crisis, will the Taoiseach explain why, in the name of God, new buses were procured for the fleet that are not accessible to wheelchair users?

At the United Nations summit, the Taoiseach made an announcement to the effect that Ireland will no longer permit drilling for oil, even though we have never found any oil. As with most such initiatives, this was extensively briefed in advance to the media but not in enough time for serious questions to be asked. The Taoiseach got a bit touchy about this and demanded a right of reply when The Sunday Business Post published an article claiming that the announcement was little more than tokenistic. For all significant announcements about the environment, it is reasonable to assume that specific work will have been completed on defining the exact likely impact of each decision. In this context, can the Taoiseach outline the specific impact on Ireland’s climate change targets that the announcement about oil exploration is likely to have? When the much-delayed and over-hyped climate change plan was announced earlier this year, it was pointed out that the Government had not published any initiatives which were capable of delivering on some of the higher-profile targets. For example, the target of having 1 million electric vehicles on the road by 2030 requires that basically all new cars sold from today onwards be electric. That clearly is not happening. Anyone I have spoken to who knows anything about this matter has indicated that the target will be impossible to achieve. What specifically does the Taoiseach intend to propose in order to dramatically and immediately increase sales of electric vehicles? It he standing by this target but leaving it to another Government to figure out how to reach it?

To clarify, I did not seek a right of reply from The Sunday Business Post. An editor or sub-editor texted me and offered me an op-ed in response to which I said: "Yes, thanks. I will take that up." The Deputy is going back to his conspiracy theories and making stuff up again.

If the Deputy has any evidence to support his claim, I am sure he will produce it.

Regarding oil exploration, it is the case that we have not had a commercial oil find but we have had drilling and oil exploration for many decades in Irish waters and that, in itself, leads to damage to the environment and the seabed. The policy is that existing oil licences and options will still be honoured but there will be no oil or gas exploration in 80% of our waters - that is, the Atlantic margin.

What will the impact of that be on our targets?

We will develop the policy and legislation to allow for exploration for natural gas to continue but not for oil. As we have always stated, this will not have an impact on our targets. Ending exploration will not reduce our emissions but it shows climate leadership in that we are sending out a clear message that we are we are getting out of fossil fuels.

The Cabinet sub-committee on the environment and climate change meets quarterly. The reason it does so is that the climate action plan contains quarterly targets, so it is designed to follow those targets and see that they are being achieved. I very much agree with the Green Party mayor of a city in Germany - I have forgotten his name - who stated that the right approach to climate action is not to act like the house is on fire or to panic. If one panics, one makes the wrong decisions. What we should do is deal with this issue in the same way as any other major issue, namely, in a logical, calm and sensible fashion.

The Government has not panicked about this for the past ten years.

There is no fear of that.

No one is accusing the Taoiseach of that.

On carbon tax, Deputy Boyd Barrett's numbers are incorrect. The carbon tax is roughly paid 50% by businesses and 50% by households. The Deputy made the incorrect assumption that it is all paid by households. That is not the case because businesses clearly use a lot of fossil fuels as well. The carbon tax increase will raise in the region of €90 million. Half of this will be paid by households. If, therefore, one divides €45 million by the number of households, namely, 2 million, the average cost per home will be just under €30 for next year. The increase in the fuel allowance protects 22% of the poorest households in the State. In fact, they are slightly better off in cash terms as a consequence of a decision we made in respect of carbon tax. Fundamentally, and this is just like many other things we tax. The amount of carbon tax somebody pays is linked to the amount of carbon they produce, not the amount they earn.

Will bus fares will go up?

That is a matter for the National Transport Authority.

That concludes Taoiseach's Questions.

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