Richard Boyd Barrett
Ceist:1. Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett asked the Taoiseach to report on the meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos. [2797/24]
Amharc ar fhreagraWednesday, 14 February 2024
Ceisteanna (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8)
Paul Murphy
Ceist:2. Deputy Paul Murphy asked the Taoiseach to report on the meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos. [2800/24]
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Bríd Smith
Ceist:3. Deputy Bríd Smith asked the Taoiseach to report on the meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos. [2804/24]
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Mick Barry
Ceist:4. Deputy Mick Barry asked the Taoiseach to report on his attendance at the World Economic Forum in Davos. [2898/24]
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Seán Haughey
Ceist:5. Deputy Seán Haughey asked the Taoiseach to report on his attendance at the World Economic Forum in Davos. [3809/24]
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Mary Lou McDonald
Ceist:6. Deputy Mary Lou McDonald asked the Taoiseach to report on his attendance at the World Economic Forum in Davos. [5100/24]
Amharc ar fhreagraMick Barry
Ceist:7. Deputy Mick Barry asked the Taoiseach to report on his attendance at the World Economic Forum in Davos. [5335/24]
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Marc Ó Cathasaigh
Ceist:8. Deputy Marc Ó Cathasaigh asked the Taoiseach to report on his engagements at the World Economic Forum. [6210/24]
Amharc ar fhreagraFreagraí ó Béal (6 píosaí cainte)
Tógfaidh mé Ceisteanna Uimh. 1 go 8, go huile, le chéile.
My programme included engagements with businesses with investments or interests in Ireland. I spoke at a dinner hosted by IDA Ireland, which was attended by business leaders from the manufacturing, chemical, technology and finance sectors. The Minister for Finance, Deputy Michael McGrath, also attended. I met with senior representatives of multinational companies with a significant imprint in Ireland. These meetings are typically an important opportunity for company executives to update me on progress with their operations in Ireland and their future development plans. I participated in a panel discussion on the hard power of artificial intelligence, which reflected on the opportunities and challenges of AI, especially in the areas of diplomacy and defence. Developments on artificial intelligence were a focus of discussions throughout the meeting, with many policymakers and business leaders conscious of the need to balance the risks and opportunities of the technology and to regulate in a way that protects the public interest while encouraging innovation. This balanced approach chimes with the approach the Government is taking.
I also attended a foreign policy-focused event organised by The Washington Post, which was attended by other European and global leaders and heads of prominent international organisations. During my visit, I had the opportunity to meet with political leaders, including Prime Minister Recean of Moldova, to whom I reaffirmed Ireland's continued backing for Moldova’s EU membership aspirations, and newly elected President Thangam of Singapore. I also met with the chair of Open Society Foundations to discuss our shared commitment to freedom of expression and the challenges facing it in today’s difficult geopolitical environment.
I have a fundamental problem with the World Economic Forum as a gathering where the world's most profitable and richest companies and billionaires rub shoulders with politicians from around the world, primarily to pursue their own interests rather than the wider interests of society.
One thing of interest I notice was that Hines, the wealth and asset management company and owner of a very significant amount of property in this country, was present in Davos this year. That is very telling. The biggest residential development in the country, the Cherrywood development in my own area, is owned by Hines, although it has flipped some of the property and made a lot of profit. It got the land from NAMA at a discount but very modest houses there are going for between €600,000 and €700,000 and rents are running at €2,500 to €3,000 a month. This is totally unaffordable for the vast majority of people. Is that the net result of these kinds of forums? Investors like Hines make an absolute fortune from real estate and residential development in this country but deliver housing that is absolutely unaffordable for the vast majority of working people and rents that are completely unaffordable. In the case of the Cherrywood development, we still do not know how much affordable housing is to be given to us in exchange for the LIHAF funding. There is still wrangling over how much affordable housing we are going to get and whether it will actually be affordable, that is, what the prices will be. Will the Taoiseach comment on that? This wealth and asset management company, Hines, has €95 billion worth of assets around the world. These are the sorts of people who are controlling our housing sector and the consequence of this is utterly unaffordable housing and rents. Does that not say something about the priorities of these corporations that swan around with politicians at the World Economic Forum in Davos?
The World Economic Forum is at the centre of all sorts of far-right conspiracy theories these days. These theories suggest that the forum rules the world. I do not believe the World Economic Forum rules the world or that there is a conspiracy here. In fact, it is simply capitalism. Capitalism operates by the governments of the world responding to the needs, interests, concerns and wishes of the ruling classes in the world, that is, the multimillionaires and billionaires. Events like the World Economic Forum at Davos are where those interests are transferred. There are meetings where these billionaires who control the world's economy say what they would like to happen and, largely speaking, politicians like the Taoiseach take that on and try to implement it.
There are some things that fuel the conspiracy theories. People who come up to me who have been impacted by some of these far-right conspiracies say that climate change could not be real because otherwise the governments and elites of the world would not be behaving in the way they are. The inaction of the world's leaders leads to that conspiracy theory. The fact that one in ten attendees at the World Economic Forum flew in, a large proportion of whom flew in on private jets spewing out huge amounts of carbon emissions, fuels this idea. People think that if climate change is as real as they say it is, and it is, then why are these people behaving in this manner?
The other thing that fuels the conspiracy theories is massive inequality and the illogical nature of a world that sees the richest five people doubling their wealth over the last five or six years while the poorest 5 billion get poorer and, in this country, the richest two people having the same wealth as the bottom 50%. That fuels those conspiracy theories because people cannot understand how we can have a system that allows this to happen.
The World Economic Forum has its critics, as we have just heard. Heads of corporations, NGOs and experts of all kinds fly in and mix with global leaders to pontificate about global issues. It can all seem a bit removed from the ordinary citizen. However, having listened to the Taoiseach's response, I can certainly see the benefits of a forum of this kind. By all accounts, the Taoiseach used the opportunity to engage with other leaders on the appalling situation in Gaza and to press for a humanitarian ceasefire and the establishment of a viable Palestinian state. We now see another disaster unfolding in Rafah. EU foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, has rightly suggested the ceasing of weapons sales to Israel by the US and other countries. I ask the Taoiseach to use whatever influence he has, particularly with the US Administration, to stop Israel's offensive on the 1.5 million civilians in Rafah and to try to bring about a humanitarian ceasefire.
It is reported today that, along with the Spanish Prime Minister, the Taoiseach has written to the President of the European Commission to express his concerns in this regard. I heard the response he gave to the Leas-Cheann Comhairle about this earlier but I would be interested to hear more about the letter, whether the Taoiseach received a response and what he actually said to Ursula von der Leyen.
A long-term strategy for climate, nature and energy was one of the key themes of the World Economic Forum. This brought the gap between rhetoric and action into public view again. Every single report published in the last year from the EPA, the SEAI or Wind Energy Ireland follows a worrying trend. They predict that Ireland is to blow right through our 2030 targets and miss the momentous opportunity to become energy secure and independent. Based on current trends and full implementation of planned climate policies and measures, the EPA projects that Ireland will only achieve a 29% reduction by 2030 rather than the 51% reduction enshrined in the climate Act. Similarly, according to a December report commissioned by Wind Energy Ireland, 95% of industry experts believe that Ireland has zero hope of delivering its energy transition at the pace and scale needed. At the close of last year, the SEAI warned that Ireland's energy emissions were not falling fast enough to stay within the Government's own carbon budget.
Even the Government's own progress reports indicate they are not doing a good enough job. They show an implementation rate of just 67%. Is it any wonder that the latest climate observatory report from the Central Bank argued that not only is Ireland performing badly we are performing worse than the majority of other EU states. Irish emissions per capita are 23% higher than the EU average and 47% higher than Britain. Moreover, Ireland has one of the lowest proportions of renewables usage amongst EU states. Despite being one of the most effective measures in the fight against climate change the roll-out of renewables here is embarrassingly slow. What is this Government going to do to address the concerns of key stakeholders concerning our 2030 targets? What effort is the Department of the Taoiseach making to improve Ireland's performance for our own targets and by way of comparison to EU partners?
I thank Deputies for their questions. As was said earlier there are lots of conspiracy theories about Davos and the World Economic Forum, and particularly online. No big decisions are made there. In fact no decisions are made at all. If that was the case I would stay for the whole thing. As it happens I had to leave early and arrive late. I arrived late because the Chinese Prime Minister was visiting Ireland, and I had to leave early because I wanted to get to an event in Galway. I can guarantee that if the far right were correct I would not have arrived late and left early; I would have been there for the whole thing to sit in some secret room and make all these decisions they believe we make. I am a bit disappointed to hear Deputy Paul Murphy in some ways almost fuelling some of those theories by arguing that he almost understands why people believe these conspiracy theories. It is the far right and the far left working together again, which is not all that unusual.
With regard to what happens there, it is a gathering of political, business and NGO leaders, along with academics and experts. It is worth attending. It is run very efficiently. There are 30-minute meeting slots, which start on time and end on time. They stick to the agenda. To organise those kinds of meetings with the people who attend - perhaps ten meetings in one day - would take weeks to organise. It is a gathering where a lot of people attend and where one can fit in a lot of meetings and get work done that otherwise would take a lot of time to organise. There are also roundtable discussions and dinners.
I did not meet Hines at Davos or any asset management companies. I am not sure if they requested to meet me or not. The letter written to President von der Leyen was published this morning but we do not have a response yet. In fairness, it was only officially submitted this morning. President von der Leyen will need a bit of time to respond to it. I spoke with her by phone earlier in the week to discuss a number of different matters and I alerted her to the fact that Prime Minister Sánchez and I were writing this letter. I thought it was important she hear that from me and not from the media.
Deputy McDonald asked questions around climate. We are making progress and progress is now accelerating. Emissions from Ireland are falling and while they are not falling fast enough they are falling. We are seeing a real improvement in the amount of renewable energy we are producing. We have a target of 80% renewable electricity by 2030. I think we will meet that target. If we miss it I do not think we will miss it by much. People were very sceptical about electric vehicles a few years ago when then Minister, Deputy Richard Bruton, produced his climate action plan on behalf of the Government at the time but we are now in line to meet those targets, which is really encouraging. We also retrofit about 35,000 homes every year. Again that is in line or exceeding our targets for retrofit. We are also seeing emissions fall from agriculture. I thank and recognise farmers for that fact. The new forestry programme will be helpful too.