Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I am very happy to support the Minister and the Department in implementing this European and international regulation. The world has changed a lot. When I was a kid we used to play with mercury in our science class in school. The Minister will remember the same, I am sure. May I ask a related question? This was agreed in 2013, and I am very much supportive of the measures, but here we are five years later and, if I read rightly, 22 other countries of the European Union 28 have already signed it and introduced the regulations. One of my concerns is the reason for this delay. We are not in disagreement on this area. As the Minister said, our levels of mercury poisoning in the water and the air are accurately described by the EPA as being very low, and there are no huge cost or other implications of this, only a €50,000 implementation fine. However, I have a general concern that the Minister's Department may not have sufficient resources to cope with the whole variety of undertakings for which it has responsibility, and I am taking this as an example. Is there a reason for this five-year delay? Are we one of the last EU countries to sign the regulations and approve the convention?

More generally, now that he has been in his current position for seven months or whatever, is the Minister, within his Department or with the Minister for Finance and Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Donohoe, of the view that his Department has the necessary scale to carry out the whole variety of functions it has at the speed and with the urgency we need?