Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 41:

In page 22, between lines 30 and 31, to insert the following:“Reports on annual targets

16.(1) The Minister shall lay before the Houses of the Oireachtas a report in respect of each year in the period 2015-2050 for which an annual target has been set (a “target year”).

(2) The report shall state whether the annual target for the target year has been met. If the annual target has not been met, the report shall explain the reason for same.

(3) The report shall also state whether the domestic effort target has been met in the target year to which the report relates.

(4) If the domestic effort target has not been met, the report shall explain the reason for same. The report shall also contain the information mentioned in section 17.

(5) The report under this section shall be laid before the Houses of the Oireachtas no later than 31 October in the second year after the target year.”.

The amendment proposes that there should be a report every year on meeting targets. We are back again to the issue of targets and the Minister and Government have made clear their view that targets should not be included, so we are going over the same old ground. However, the question of this becoming a central part of political debate and something we are required to discuss in the Dáil is important. Given that the mitigation plan, for example, only has to be produced every five years, there is quite a big time gap in between. That will not allow for adequate debate and focus on this critical issue. The logic behind the amendment is that we should be required to debate it at least once a year, as the budget is.