Ossian Smyth (Dún Laoghaire, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputies for their contributions. As I said to Deputy Bruton, I am certainly not dismissing requests out of hand at all. I am certainly willing to consider it on the next Stage and consider where the scope should lie.

In response to Deputy Whitmore, climate change and biodiversity are deeply entwined and obviously very closely linked. If emissions are increased, biodiversity can be damaged and if biodiversity is disimproved, say by cutting down a forest, emissions can disimprove; the two things are very closely linked. In the same way, transport is very closely linked with emissions and so are home heating, agriculture and electricity generation, so we have these very close linkages all across the economy and they are not simple to disentangle. As I said to Deputy Bruton, we will see to what extent we should include biodiversity aims in this particular Bill and to what extent it should be put into separate biodiversity legislation.

On Deputy Naughten's point about carbon leakage, as far as I know there is a definition of it in section 6 of the Bill. Carbon leakage, as the Deputy says, is a really complex area; it is different for different sectors. Sometimes, if a state stops doing something, if emissions are reduced in one sector in a country, it could automatically be replaced with increases in another sector. In other areas there is simply no carbon leakage all. It is, by definition, something to be solved by international cooperation. The point of EU cooperation, the Paris Agreement, the next Conference of the Parties, COP, and so on is to work out those details on carbon leakage. Carbon leakage should never be used as an excuse for inaction and for us to say that if we do not do this in our country, somebody is going to do it in another. Clearly, there are some areas where there is zero carbon leakage. For example, if one takes the bus instead of driving to work it is not like that is going cause something else in another country. It is certainly something to be regarded and examined carefully. Carbon leakage is complex but is not to be used as an excuse.