Denis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I would like to comment briefly on the Minister's responses. In terms of data centres, we all accept that the direct economic activity from data centres is minimal. Using the construction dividend in terms of it is undermining our housing programme across the country. The Minister is correct that once these data centres are completed the amount of direct jobs generated is small. In terms of indirect jobs, I fully accept the argument that is being made in that regard. We have far more data centres being developed in this country than just those linked to high value jobs across our economy.

As I have said previously to the Minister at Cabinet, I believe it is immoral that families across this country who are struggling to pay electricity bills should be subsidising the cost of electricity supplied to data centres across the country. I firmly believe that is immoral and I argued vehemently in that regard at Cabinet, as reflected in the Government policy statement issued on the matter. This particular element of the commitment in that policy statement has yet to be implemented. We need data centres paying for their own costs in terms of the electricity infrastructure that is being put in place and in terms of the generation of green electricity. This cost should never be put on the backs of struggling families across this country. I accept the type of model that is being introduced here in terms of carbon tax is an allocation of revenue approach. This is where we fundamentally differ. I believe that if an environmental tax is structured well it should not create the revenue in the first instance. It should motivate people to change and avoid the tax being generated in the first instance. That is the difference between our two approaches in regard to this issue.

I will make two final points. In terms of agriculture, the Minister will know that the €3 million that is being invested this year in the pilot environmental scheme is the same €3 million invested last year in the pilot environmental scheme that never went ahead and is now being rolled over into next year. I made the point earlier that none of the €27 million that will be paid out of farmers' pockets next year in carbon taxes will go back into the agricultural sector. That is the fundamental weakness in terms of the model and approach that the Minister is taking at the moment.

The Minister is 100% correct that the national broadband plan is very much about reducing the emissions profile of people in rural communities. I know that the Green Party had opposed it in opposition. The leader of the Green Party was very critical that his own constituency would end up with poorer broadband than rural areas and he did not agree with it for that reason. Is that the reason there is no additional money being put into the national broadband plan over and above the money that the Minister and I agreed to be invested next year to help fast-track the delivery of the national broadband plan, which we both agree would help to reduce the emissions profile of people living in rural communities?