Gerry Adams
Ceist:1. Deputy Gerry Adams asked the Taoiseach the work of the social policy and public service reform division of his Department. [49005/17]
Ceisteanna - Questions (Resumed)
Departmental Policy Functions
Richard Boyd Barrett
Ceist:2. Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the work of the social policy and public service reform division of his Department. [50209/17]
Brendan Howlin
Ceist:3. Deputy Brendan Howlin asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the work of the social policy and public service reform division of his Department; and if he plans to make changes. [50470/17]
I propose to take Questions Nos. 1 to 3, inclusive, together.
The role of the social policy and public service reform division is to support me, as Taoiseach, and the Government in delivering on the programme for Government objective of public policies and services which support a socially inclusive and fair society. The division supports the work of Cabinet committee B and the associated senior officials group. This covers social policy and public service reform and seeks to ensure a co-ordinated approach to policy areas such as education, children, equality and reform of public services. It also supports the work of Cabinet committee E and the associated senior officials group. They deal with issues relating to health, including improvements in health service delivery and the development of the Government's response to the Sláintecare report. The division also provides the secretariat for the Civil Service Management Board which is chaired by the Secretary General of my Department and oversees implementation of the Civil Service renewal plan and incorporates the programme for Government office which publishes regular progress reports on implementation of the programme for Government. The division is also responsible for liaison with the National Economic and Social Council, NESC, which falls within the remit of my Department and supports the north-east inner city initiative, including the programme implementation board and the oversight group.
The division also provides me with briefings and speech material on social policy and public service reform issues and participates in relevant interdepartmental committees with other groups. Given the nature of its role the division works closely with the line Departments which have day to day responsibility for specific policy areas.
The Taoiseach has outlined the broad remit for the social policy and public service reform division but it is fair to say that its responsibility to ensure that public policies and services are socially inclusive and fair, that they concern equality, is not working. The Taoiseach has already acknowledged that a homeless citizen died yesterday and there are reports that another homeless citizen died today. The Taoiseach has extended his condolences to the family involved. I also extend my condolences.
The Peter McVerry Trust has said that seven homeless people have died in the past 12 weeks. That is totally unacceptable. This situation of course demands our condolences but it demands much more than that. We are told that 184 citizens are lying in the cold and it is bitterly cold now. It is reported that 50 adults were in the Merchant's Quay night café because they were unable to get an emergency bed. I know the Taoiseach dealt with this earlier but I would like him to outline again the emergency measures the Government has planned to help citizens sleeping on the streets, in shop doorways or in tents and to deal with the trauma for 3,000 children and their parents who will celebrate Christmas living in totally inappropriate accommodation. There are rumours, although I cannot support them, that some of those in hotels and boarding houses may lose their places because some of those establishments are looking for other customers. Will the Government revisit the Focus Ireland amendment to the Residential Tenancies (Amendment) Act 2015 to limit landlords issuing vacant possession notices to quit?
The Taoiseach may have received an email from Peter McVerry today pointing out that seven individuals have died sleeping rough in the past 12 weeks, which is both unprecedented and shameful. There is the shocking fact that 3,000 children are in emergency accommodation. Peter McVerry is asking for very specific things to respond to this. Will the Taoiseach agree to what he is asking for? He wants a formal assessment of the number of people sleeping rough carried out by local authorities; local authorities to provide a dedicated phone number for members of the public who can identify people sleeping rough in their areas so that help can be given to them; each local authority to have a dedicated rough sleeper response team with transport to cover out-of-hours periods; a commitment that rough sleeping would be ended completely by 2018 which he points out that requires between 250 and 300 people to be housed through the Housing First programme; and that each local authority draw up a Housing First plan to house rapidly and offer intensive case management to recently housed former rough sleepers. Will the Taoiseach agree to that?
I want the Taoiseach to reconsider the comments he made earlier about the problems of big social housing estates. This is the excuse for not delivering the scale of public housing we need on the public housing land that we have. Problems generated in social housing estates are not because of anything intrinsic to social housing estates. They are to do with the lack of infrastructure put into estates built in the past. We need large scale provision of council housing with the infrastructure and services but that cannot be an excuse for not delivering the scale of public housing we need to address this crisis.
The social policy and public service reform division of the Department of the Taoiseach is a very important one. I understand the position of assistant secretary, the most senior in the division, is now vacant. When will it be filled?
I join others who have spoken about the announcement that two citizens of our country, rough sleepers, have been found dead on the streets in recent days. On my behalf and on behalf of the party, I send condolences to the friends and families involved. There are 8,000 homeless people, 3,000 of whom are children. The Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government has said that these statistics will worsen and that speaks volumes of itself.
Rough sleepers should be an isolated policy focus for the Government. This is a very complex issue and the solution is not simply housing. That is why the wraparound supports of the Housing First model have been recommended. This is the most urgent focus we need. What will the Government do to ensure that the needs of the 180 plus people who are rough sleepers will be addressed?
How many people work in the social policy and public service reform division and how many work on the Sláintecare report and policy which the Taoiseach says the Government is considering?
The Taoiseach indicated yesterday that the communications unit, which is under his command – he picked the head man for it - would organise communications campaigns particularly on the children's hospital. I would have thought that as the children's hospital has a bespoke legislative framework it would have its own public relations-----
It has.
It has been liaising with all Deputies for quite some time. The project goes back a long time over successive Governments.
It does not belong to anyone. It does not belong to the Taoiseach although he has sometimes claimed it does. The decisions predated the Taoiseach's role. The former Minister for Health, now Senator Reilly, had an impact. Mary Harney even had an impact but the planning derailed that project.
It was in the 2011 capital programme.
My point is that there is a sense that the real function of the communications unit and the €5 million of taxpayers' money is to promote the Government and the Ministers, not the hospital. I genuinely believe there is a danger in how this grows and evolves. If a hospital is a self-contained entity in its work it is difficult to comprehend why its communications agenda is located within the Department of the Taoiseach. All the good news relating to it therefore is for the Taoiseach. The blurring of party politics with the Civil Service is a governance issue that the Taoiseach does not understand. We need to be very careful about it. I do not see why it is necessary to have a separate campaign on the children's hospital while there is a bespoke model and framework there already.
The range of questions was diverse but I will do my best to answer as many as I can. Deputy Adams is of course correct in saying that approximately seven homeless people have died in recent weeks. Roughly speaking, between 40 and 50 homeless people die every year. Each one is a tragedy and very sad. People who are homeless die for all sorts of different reasons, whether physical health, overdose, addiction, mental health issues, suicide or violence on some occasions. That speaks to the fact that this is such a complex social issue and is not just a simple matter of providing shelter or housing. A range of supports is required, particularly in the health area, relating to mental health and addiction, and overdose in particular. That is a difficult problem that we face as a country. It is one faced all over the world.
Additional beds are being provided to ensure that we have a surplus number of beds available in the city and around the country.
Approximately 60 will come onstream today, with another 60 before the end of the week, on Little Britain Street and in Cabra. The intention is to have another 200 beds in single or double rooms. They are not Florence Nightingale institutional type accommodation. We will have 200 in place by 18 December and the intention is to ensure there is a bed and shelter available for everyone who wants it and needs it. This is something we want to ensure is in place not just for the winter period, but also through to spring and summer.
We have also had the development of the family hubs, of which people are aware, providing much more appropriate family-type accommodation, where people can make their own food and have access to recreational areas. As a result of the development of family hubs, the number of families with children who are being accommodated in bed and breakfasts and hotels has fallen since it peaked last spring. We hope to see more progress on this front in the coming months.
Housing First was specifically mentioned, and I mentioned it earlier myself. It is a programme to take people who are rough sleeping and provide them with housing, but not just housing. They need to be able to hang onto the housing so we need to put in place a range of social, health and other supports so they can stay in the house or apartment they are given and do not end up rough sleeping again. A total of 180 people have already been moved out of homelessness and rough sleeping into a Housing First model. At the request of the various charities and agencies that work in the sector, a national director for Housing First will be appointed. That appointment will be made in the next two weeks. I hope it will make a difference in the months and years ahead.
On public housing, as I mentioned earlier, 2,000 houses, or homes, will have been directly built by local authorities this year. This needs to be ramped up over time. It was only a couple of hundred a few years ago and we are up to 2,000 this year. It will be 3,800 next year, in addition to the voids being brought into use and long-term leases such as the Iveagh Trust one I was at a couple of days ago. I know people do not count them, but I think they should be counted and certainly the people living in them are counted. There are also direct purchases from developers through Part V and other mechanisms. These will bring the number of new social homes available to be occupied to more than 7,000 next year for people and their families. We will see a real ramping up in the provision of public housing in the coming years.
In terms of general supply, commencement notices are up significantly, as are planning permissions. We are seeing about a 50% increase in all of these, so we are starting to see the development of new homes and houses in Dublin and throughout the country, but it is coming from a very low base and we acknowledge as a Government that it will take time for us to get to the point where the number of new homes is meeting the demand for new homes and then to get ahead of it. This is not something we will be able to do quickly, and no Government would be able to do it quickly.
I was struck by the honesty of the Sinn Féin housing spokesperson at the Sinn Féin Ard Fheis recently, where he enunciated the Sinn Féin policy on social housing, which is to build approximately 10,000 a year until the housing list is cleared. That would still leave people waiting nine or ten years on the housing list before they would get their house. It would require two terms of Sinn Féin in office for people joining the housing list today to get social housing. I thought that was very honest. It is the reality of what it will take to get on top of these issues, because we cannot just ramp up social housing or private housing overnight. There are capacity constraints of all sorts, but we are going to ramp it up as quickly as we possibly can, and that is with regard to social housing as well as private housing.
We will now move on to Question No. 4.
On a point of order, the groupings are really bizarre.
The Taoiseach did not answer the question on hostels.
I was getting to it.
The Taoiseach took his time to get to it.
Ask it again in the next round.
The next group starts with Question No. 4, which asks the Taoiseach his plans to attend the climate change summit in Paris on 12 December. The next group starts with a question I tabled, to ask the Taoiseach whether he plans to attend the climate change summit in Paris. It is the same question but it is in two different groups. Question No. 4 has been grouped with questions on Gothenburg and the social summit.
It makes no sense.
It makes no sense at all. We will deal with the same question in two different groups. I suggest we deal with climate change in the next group and deal with Gothenburg in this group.
Is the Taoiseach happy with that?
That is fine. We will deal with Gothenburg in this group and climate change in the next.
Over to you, Taoiseach.
I have two questions, one on Gothenburg and one on Paris.
The Deputy will get two opportunities.
We will call you. You are here in front of me, do not worry.
Deputy Burton wins on both.
The Ceann Comhairle is very generous.
EU Meetings
Joan Burton
Ceist:5. Deputy Joan Burton asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the European Council meeting of Heads of State and Government in Gothenburg, Sweden on 17 November 2017. [49175/17]
Micheál Martin
Ceist:7. Deputy Micheál Martin asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the EU social summit in Gothenburg; and the issues that were discussed. [49849/17]
Micheál Martin
Ceist:8. Deputy Micheál Martin asked the Taoiseach if he held bilaterals at the EU summit on social rights in Gothenburg; and the issues that were discussed. [49850/17]
Gerry Adams
Ceist:9. Deputy Gerry Adams asked the Taoiseach if he has had engagement with the Prime Minister of Poland, Ms Beata Szydło, recently. [50150/17]
Gerry Adams
Ceist:10. Deputy Gerry Adams asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the informal meeting of European Union Heads of State and Government held on 17 November 2017. [50152/17]
Brendan Howlin
Ceist:11. Deputy Brendan Howlin asked the Taoiseach if he will report on his attendance at the EU social summit in Gothenburg in November 2017. [50201/17]
Richard Boyd Barrett
Ceist:12. Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett asked the Taoiseach if he will report on his visit to Gothenburg. [50597/17]
I propose to take Questions Nos. 5 and 7 to 12, inclusive, together.
I attended the social summit for fair jobs and growth in Gothenburg, Sweden, on 17 November, with the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Affairs, Deputy Doherty, and the Minister of State with responsibility for European affairs, Deputy McEntee. This was organised jointly by Swedish Prime Minister, Stefan Löfven, and European Commission President, Jean-Claude Juncker.
The social summit gathered EU leaders, social partners and other stakeholders for an open discussion on how to promote fair jobs and growth. The focus was on learning from each other's national experiences, particularly in making the most of new opportunities, and tackling common challenges for the labour markets and welfare models of today and tomorrow.
During the summit, the inter-institutional proclamation on the European pillar of social rights was signed by the Presidents of the Council, Parliament and Commission. This represents important reinforcement of political commitment by the member states and the EU institutions to supporting key social policy objectives at both national and EU levels.
The social summit was followed by a working lunch for leaders, chaired by the European Council President, Donald Tusk. This was the first in a series of discussions under his leaders' agenda, as endorsed by the European Council in October, and it focused on education and culture. While the EU has limited competence in these areas, we had constructive exchanges on how we could do more, including on initiatives such as a stronger Erasmus programme. I expect that the outcome of both the social summit and our leaders' agenda discussion will be reflected in the conclusions we adopt at the forthcoming December European Council.
I also had a meeting with the Prime Minister May in Gothenburg and reported to the House on 22 November all about this meeting. I did not have any formal meetings with other Heads of State and Government while in Gothenburg. However, I did take the opportunity, as is customary at these events, to speak with many of them on many issues in the margins of the summit and during the meals.
I have not yet had the opportunity for a formal meeting with Polish Prime Minister Szydlo. However, I did speak to her in Gothenburg in June and October at the European Councils, and at September’s digital summit in Tallinn. We sat beside each other for one of the meals.
Ongoing political engagement with our EU and international partners remains crucial, especially as negotiations on Brexit proceed, and I will continue to take advantage of every opportunity to advance Ireland's interests with my fellow members of the European Council.
I call Deputy Ryan.
No, afterwards.
The Deputy passes.
I am glad the Taoiseach attended Gothenburg because, hopefully, this is a return to an EU which will develop a serious anti-poverty programme not just for Ireland, but for the whole of the EU and particularly for countries such as Greece, which have not been able to exit their problems. I want to ask the Taoiseach about two issues. When I was Minister for Social Protection, there was a lot of work done at an incredibly slow pace on a European social pillar, in other words, and this is what Gothenburg was partly about, a strong social security system in each country. It would be a Europe of strong social security systems in each country that would help people and provide a cushion of safety.
Most importantly, we will not get people out of poverty and into a reasonably comfortable standard of living unless we address wages. Does the Taoiseach agree with some of the thinking about Gothenburg, that we need to maintain wage levels in the European Union as an absolute priority? This is something I know Fine Gael does not like, but we must return to social partnership and have national agreements that actually help those people at the bottom of the wage scale, including people who are bogusly self-employed.
The European social pillar document and strategy launched at the summit sets out a series of principles of social policy, which are accepted by member states. It has no justiciable basis, of course, but it is intended as a means of setting broad objectives for national and European Union activity.
It is a very worthy document but it is not clear what importance is attached to it. It is a pity the Government did not publish a national position on that document beforehand, which we could have debated in the House. There is a failure when we develop inflated rhetoric about social policy which is not followed up by action because of basic issues such as the European Union budget and widely differing social support systems. I recall plenty of rhetoric around social guarantees and the Youth Guarantee but it was just rhetoric, with little funding to support it. Can the Taoiseach detail what specific actions he is undertaking following the signing of the European Pillar of Social Rights?
The document mentions individual access to housing and the Taoiseach will note that, despite the attempt to relativise homelessness figures at the Fine Gael conference, the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government has admitted the problem will get worse. I have heard that phrase previously. When the Taoiseach was appointed Minister for Health one of his first pronouncements was that the situation would get worse and, by God, it did get worse. I got very worried, therefore, when the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government said at the Fine Gael conference that the situation would get worse. How much worse will it get before it will improve? Has the Taoiseach any idea of what his Minister was commenting on?
The Taoiseach noted the importance of continued contacts with our European partners on Brexit. The media today are reporting that the British have agreed to pay between €45 billion and €55 billion in its settlement of the divorce bill. That will obviously increase demands by the British that the European Union meeting two weeks hence will accept this as substantial progress and move to negotiations on a new trade deal. That means there will be a focus on what progress has been made on two outstanding issues of the current negotiations, the Border and the status of EU citizens in the North. So far, there has been no detailed plan from the British for how they intend to resolve these matters. The Taoiseach and the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade, Deputy Coveney, have been insisting, quite rightly, that no progress can be made to advance to the trade talks without real guarantees and commitments from the British on the Border.
I acknowledge that it is better to resolve all these issues diplomatically, but we are now coming to a critical point in the negotiations. The Taoiseach has a veto. Is he prepared to use it? I appeal to him to be resolved to do so. The right of citizens in the North to EU citizenship is a fundamental part of this. I appeal to the Taoiseach to ensure there is progress on both of these issues and that this be the Government's red line in the forthcoming negotiations.
The Taoiseach will agree there has been a great deal of strain on the European project in recent years, with increased nationalism and an increased number of votes for nationalist and anti-EU parties across the European Union. He will probably agree that much of that is predicated on the loss of faith in the European project as a social project that impacts positively on the people of Europe and not simply an international trade agreement, as it is sometimes characterised particularly by some commentators in the United Kingdom. Will the Taoiseach acknowledge that signing the European Pillar of Social Rights is a fundamental and important readjustment? On a number of occasions I raised the fact that in the negotiations preceding this agreement Ireland sought to water it down. That was not an auspicious or desirable stand for the country to take. However, now that it has been signed it is important, and Deputy Martin made this point, to have an Irish implementation plan. Is it the Taoiseach's view that we must reconnect with people to ensure that the vision of Europe is a social Europe that incorporates rights for working people and standards of decency? Will we have an implementation plan on issues such as zero-hour and if-and-when contracts and other important matters such as housing and so forth? Will the Taoiseach undertake to produce such a national implementation plan?
If I was going to a summit on social issues in Europe I would certainly make the point, and I hope the Taoiseach did this, that the biggest social crisis facing this country is housing and homelessness and that it is at appalling emergency levels. A little known fact, but one noted by Mercy Law Resource Centre among others, is that, incredibly, Ireland opted out of the right to housing provisions of the European Social Charter, even though it was used to sell the Lisbon treaty to us. I presume it was Fianna Fáil that made this decision, which shows its commitment to social housing even then. Should we not opt into the provision on the right to housing in the European Social Charter?
Second, to what extent does the Taoiseach think that EU state aid and competition rules are causing us a problem in delivering the social and public housing we need? Certainly in my local authority area, and I presume this happens everywhere else, the tendering processes that require us most of the time to outsource work on public housing are one of the major areas of bureaucracy and delay preventing us from delivering the public housing that is required.
There was a wide range of questions, a number of which are tangential to the questions that were tabled. However, as always, I will try my best to answer as many questions as possible.
I was pleased to represent the Government at Gothenburg for the social summit. As I mentioned in my video piece at the end of the summit with the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection, Deputy Regina Doherty, and the Minister of State at the Department of the Taoiseach, Deputy McEntee, it was an opportunity for us to reignite the engine of social Europe. There is a sense across Europe, not just among politicians but particularly among citizens, that in the last decade Europe has focused so much on banking, deficits, fiscal matters, finance and trade it has been to the detriment of everything else. Europe has never just been an economic community or a free trade area. It has always been about more than that. Many of the labour and social rights we have in Ireland flow from European law, whether it is equal pay for equal work or the fact that child benefit was moved from being paid to the father to being paid to the mother. It all happened as a consequence of progressive European legislation.
The vision set out in the paper is very much one that was shared by the Christian democrats and social democrats who established the European project in the first place. That vision was of a social market economy, the belief that market economies are the best ways to produce wealth and employment for people while also recognising the role of government in ensuring social progress by using the market economy and harnessing its wealth and job producing effects to bring about social good. The original speeches of the famous men and women who founded the European Economic Community spoke a great deal about the social market economy. It is a political philosophy that my party very much supports.
We are very supportive of the declaration. While we had some reservations along the way we were happy to sign it. Of course, it is not legally binding but it will guide future European regulations and directives in areas such as labour rights, social protection and pension rights. One of the points I made was that it had to work in terms of portability. The world of work is changing all the time. Most people entering the workforce now will probably have a number of different employers, will be self-employed for periods of their life and employees for other periods and they will probably travel a great deal. They will work in more than one country. However, our social welfare systems are not set up to reflect that properly. This gives us an opportunity to develop more European law in these areas.
It is interesting and fascinating, however, to see the different approaches that countries adopt to it.
A number of people in this House would see the Nordic countries and their flexicurity model as being one of the better and more developed labour markets and social market economies, but the Nordic countries are among the most sceptical when it comes to further EU harmonisation in this area because they feel harmonisation and making things the same across Europe could harmonise things downwards. They are among the countries that are most sceptical about the European Pillar of Social Rights for that reason. It is fascinating to see the different perspectives people have.
We discussed the possibility of a European minimum wage. I spoke very much in favour of a European minimum wage but, of course, that would be on the basis that there would then be a national top up to take account of the different costs of living in different European countries.
In terms of social partnership, I am very pleased that the Government was able to negotiate a very good public sector pay deal with the public sector unions. Legislation for that is now going through the House and will bring about pay restoration and pay increases in some cases throughout next year and through to 2020. When it comes to social partnership with the private sector, both IBEC and ICTU take the view that they do not want to go down that road and that the existing bargaining mechanisms are working for them and their members, but it is not something we would rule out in the future if we needed to achieve price stability among other things.
We will now move on to Question No. 13.
Question No. 4.
And Question No. 6.
We will be including those.
Climate Change Policy
Eamon Ryan
Ceist:4. Deputy Eamon Ryan asked the Taoiseach his plans to attend the climate change summit in Paris on 12 December 2017 and if he will report on discussions he has had with President Macron regarding the summit. [50599/17]
Joan Burton
Ceist:6. Deputy Joan Burton asked the Taoiseach if he will report on the invitation he has received from President Macron of France to attend a climate change summit in Paris on 12 December 2017. [49176/17]
Brendan Howlin
Ceist:13. Deputy Brendan Howlin asked the Taoiseach if he plans to attend the climate change summit in Paris and the number of staff in his Department who work on this issue within the economic division. [50472/17]
Micheál Martin
Ceist:14. Deputy Micheál Martin asked the Taoiseach the position regarding his Department's strategy statement and its commitment to moving focus from negotiation to implementation of Ireland's international climate change commitments. [49415/17]
I propose to take Questions Nos. 4, 6, 13 and 14 together.
I was invited to participate in the "One Planet" Summit on 12 December in Paris by the Secretary General of the United Nations, António Guterres, the President of France, Emmanuel Macron, and the President of the World Bank Group, Jim Yong Kim. Unfortunately, I will not be able to attend this summit and I have passed on my regrets. The Government will be represented by the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment. While I had no discussions about the summit with those organising it, I have made clear my view that climate change is one of the most pressing issues of our time and the Government is fully committed to the implementation of the Paris agreement.
The damage that was done to our country through an international study ranking us as the worst in Europe was only made worse earlier this week when we saw the latest EPA figures showing that our emissions rose by 3% in 2016. Emissions in every sector grew with no sign of anything stopping this incredible increase in pollution for which we are responsible and that is doing real damage to our country. In the Taoiseach's discussion with President Macron on 24 October last, did President Macron mention the fact that he may be setting a different example? President Macron has agreed to phase out coal power by 2022. Would we not do something similar to try to restore our reputation? President Macron is committed to doubling wind and solar power. Would we not look to do something similar?
President Macron's government has set a timeline for phasing out the fossil fuel-based car fleet and has committed to do no more exploration in the Atlantic waters, which are just the same or very similar to our waters. It is reported that the Taoiseach is a keen admirer of President Macron. Would the Taoiseach not think of replicating some of those measures that would start to restore our reputation because if we keep on the way we are going, this will increasingly be a black spot on this country and we will miss out on the economic opportunities that exist from those countries that are showing a lead? When the Taoiseach talks with President Macron, does President Macron mention climate change? Do the Taoiseach and President Macron ever talk about some of the initiatives President Macron is delivering which we could imitate and restore our reputation?
I think people and businesses are way ahead of this Government when it comes to understanding the seriousness of climate change and how we all have to act both individually and collectively. As the Taoiseach travels this evening or today, for example, if he travels along the Navan Road and through Castleknock, he will see lots of houses with solar panels on the roof and vast numbers of skips outside doors and gardens where people are re-insulating their houses. When the Taoiseach goes to Paris, rather than going as the poor relation looking for a handout of some kind, could he go with a message that the Government will actually play catch up with people and businesses in Ireland? He should look to Intel's recent announcement. We have yet to have an electric train that travels from Dublin to Cork or indeed from Dublin to Belfast. The Taoiseach has been in office for a significant period and we have heard nothing about his vision of where he hopes to make the country better. He should not be looking for handouts and concessions when he goes to Paris. Will he go with a plan that will make people in Ireland proud. While it is difficult and expensive to deal with climate change and we must find resources, will we start with electric trains and electrifying the bus fleet in Dublin instead of having filthy diesel buses driven by fabulous staff in Dublin Bus?
Deputy Eamon Ryan has already put on the record of the House the fact that the EPA has shown this week that our emissions increased by 3.5% this year due to increased activity in dairy, energy and transport. It may have escaped national focus because of political controversy in recent days but because of that, this nation is facing fines of at least €455 million, which is an enormous sum, by 2020 and maybe up to €600 million. The year 2020 is not that far away and €600 million would gobble up a fair chunk of any available fiscal space we might have and should be devoting to other more productive uses building the capacity of this State. We are already well behind the curve. What specifically are we going to do? Are we just going to sail into a situation where we are going to buy carbon credits and face fines rather than take a really proactive line now to bring the actual greenhouse gas emissions we create in this country into line with the commitments we made openly and voluntarily to the international community?
I agree with Deputies who spoke previously, particularly Deputies Eamon Ryan, Joan Burton and Brendan Howlin, regarding the Government's abject performance on climate change. Indeed I would trace this back to when the current Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development was Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government. I think Fine Gael took the position that dealing with climate change was electorally damaging, particularly in rural Ireland, and essentially jettisoned any real commitment to it. This has been manifest since then. One can see it with the recent Heritage Bill, which concerned ditches and hedges. Where did that spring from? Who were the influencers that said we needed legislation on that, which was quite significant in its destruction of biodiversity? I spoke to many farmers who really did not have an agenda to do this.
Fianna Fáil voted for it.
No, we did not. The Deputy knows we amended that Bill in the Seanad. I am just making the point that in terms of the introduction of that Bill, nobody knows where it came from unless there were hidden influences behind it. The point I am trying to make is that there is an absence of vision regarding the agenda across the board in terms of renewable energy support schemes, renewable heating incentives, not meeting targets and so forth. The broader question is that hundreds of millions of euro will be lost in the coming years through fines and, as Deputy Howlin noted, the buying of carbon credits when that money could be used far more effectively in transport initiatives in particular. We will have an issue with agriculture and food if we are not careful. I believe in food security and I believe we need food production, but the transport sector is getting out of control again in terms of emissions and radical action is required in this sector to change the paradigm around our climate change policy.
The EPA has warned that this State will only reach between 4% and 6% of our 2020 emissions target. As others have said, the EPA revealed that last year our greenhouse gas emissions increased by 3.5%. We are one of only four states in the EU that are still producing emissions above the 1990 levels and will also be one of the very few to miss the 20% reduction target. It has been established by the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Communications, Climate Action and Environment that fines could be between €1 billion and €1.5 billion.
Will the Taoiseach explain why the Government is failing to take the necessary action to avoid this? Will he respond to the 13 recommendations of the Citizens' Assembly on climate change? Will the Government incorporate them into Government policy? Will the Taoiseach update the Dáil on the national adoption framework which is to set out the strategy to be employed to reduce the vulnerability of the State to the negative effects of climate change? Will these proposals be available by 10 December, as promised?
Our shocking failure to reduce CO2 emissions has been further exposed by the EPA's report. Is the Taoiseach willing to take the radical action necessary and end the special pleading for our pathetic performance? Both Deputy Bríd Smith and Deputy Eamon Ryan this week and last week submitted Bills proposing to grant no more licences for the exploration of oil and gas. If we were to do that, we would contribute significantly as a country. Deputy Bríd Smith reports from the Bonn summit that delegates were very excited about the prospect that if it happened in Ireland, like the fracking ban, it could have a huge impact internationally. If we were to make that decision, we could go from being the worst to being a leader.
I have been banging on in the Dáil for the past six years about forests and trees. Our performance in afforestation is shockingly bad. It is one of the worst in Europe. We are missing all our targets. Our level of forest cover is pathetically low. The Larry Goodmans of this world and the big ranchers are to blame because they want the land for their businesses, but we need to increase the level of our forest cover. There are ways to do this that farmers would get behind if we were to support them and explain how increasing the level of forest cover on their land would benefit them financially and the environment without infringing on other things. We need to do something about Coillte's failure to plant trees.
Deputy Joan Burton may not have heard the answer to the original question she asked. I am not going to Paris on 12 December. I will not be seeking any handout. I will not even be present; I will be in the House-----
That is a pity.
-----no doubt talking to Members about the European Council summit which will happen 40 hours later. I will have to prioritise the summit in Brussels on 14 and 15 December over going to Paris on 12 December. It would not be possible for me to attend the House to speak to Members about that crucial summit if I was to be in Paris for the two days before the summit. I will not be in Paris looking for handouts. I am happy to assure the House that that will not be the case as I will not be there.
To respond to Deputy Eamon Ryan's questions about President Macron, to the best of my recollection, he did not specifically mention any of those things. We touched on climate change and also discussed the Mercosur. Ireland and France are very much aligned in their wish to protect their respective beef industries which are more carbon efficient than beef production in South America. One thing we need to make sure we will not do in trying to tackle climate change is displace production to other countries that are less carbon efficient than us.
We are examining the future role of the Moneypoint plant, our major coal-burning power plant, and also of the peat-fired stations as the PSO will run out in a number of years. As it is unlikely to be renewed, we will have to consider whether these stations can continue or whether they should be burn alternative fuels such as biomass.
The ten-year capital programme, on which we are working, will have a very strong climate change focus. It will not be enough to satisfy the Government's critics who include everyone present in the Chamber, apart from the Minister, Deputy Katherine Zappone, and I, but it will be a big step forward in terms of our response to climate change.
I would say the Minister, Deputy Katherine Zappone, has some private views on that matter.
She surely has.
The things it will do in the areas of public transport and infrastructure will be aimed at modernising the bus fleet. It is not as simple as going electric in one year or moving to natural gas or fuel cells or other fuels. We actually have to build the fuelling plants in lots of places, which raises the question of whether depots should still be where they are. It will include actions to modernise the bus fleet and move away from existing fuels. On rail electrification, it would not be practical to electrify all of the railways; it would be practical to electrify some of them.
There will be investment in cycle ways and greenways in addition to what is happening. The plan will also include the capital plans for EirGrid and the ESB and their plans to bring more renewables into the system to also make the grid smart.
There will be provision for further investment in forestry above what is planned. The Minister, Deputy Denis Naughten, has announced the renewable heat initiative which will come into effect next year. He is also very advanced in introducing new price supports for renewable energy initiatives, including solar energy, for example.
I hope it will be better than the Northern scheme.
Another thing we will have to consider which will have to be discussed in the context of the confidence and supply arrangement is what we should do with carbon taxes in the years ahead. It is my view that we should increase them in the years ahead, both to discourage the production of CO2, one of the greenhouse gases that causes climate change, and also potentially as a means to raise funds to pay some of the fines. We could pay some of them by taxing the bad behaviour and bad activities that will cause the fines to arise. That is something that will have to be discussed in the context of the confidence and supply arrangement because we would not be able to do it without the facilitation of the main Opposition party.
We could invest instead in public transport in advance.
There were no such proposals before the last budget.
I have mentioned public transport. We do not have any oil, despite constantly being told by the far left about all of the oil we have given away. We do not actually have any oil; therefore, we have not given any away. We have some gas but not very much. Notwithstanding the fact that climate change is happening and caused by fossil fuels, for the long foreseeable future we will still need some oil and gas, whether to produce power, particularly when there are high demands for it, or to fly aeroplanes. To my knowledge, nobody has yet developed an aircraft that does not require fossil fuels at the very least as a backup. We need them for plastics and things such as-----
Lighters.
-----medical devices.
That seems like a Macron explanation.
We will continue to need some oil and gas into the future. Does it make sense for us to buy it from the Middle East or South America or should we produce it ourselves?
That concludes questions to the Taoiseach.
Written Answers are published on the Oireachtas website.