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

The purpose of this series of amendments is to ensure that we have a proper planning approach, that is, a plan-led approach to the development and protection of our marine area and resources and, in particular, to ensure compliance with the marine spatial planning directives and the protections and requirements of those directives, which are about having a proper planning regime for managing our marine resources. Last weekend, I took the time to read the December 2020 report entitled Building Offshore Wind by the lobbying group on behalf of the wind energy industry. I did so in advance of a public meeting we held on this issue last night. It might be of interest to the Minister of State that the meeting was packed with people who are very concerned. The overwhelming sentiment at the meeting was that we absolutely need to develop offshore wind and address the climate crisis but there is deep concern and anxiety that we do not have a plan-led approach but, rather, a developer-led approach.

The detail of the report by Wind Energy Ireland, WEI, which has been lobbying very hard, is damning in this regard. In the document, WEI explicitly states on several occasions that we need a developer-led approach and rails against a plan-led approach. It explicitly states that private developers and the industry should decide site selection. This is a key issue. It came across very strongly at the meeting last night that if the industry selects the sites, then we can forget about the maritime area regulatory authority and all this legislation because there actually is a momentum under way which determines the outcome or is very likely to do so. This industry is explicitly saying it should decide how we do the development offshore and that we should not plan. However, the directives insist on planning and a plan-led approach. That approach should start with the selection of sites but that is not what is happening. It is not what is happening with the designation of projects. WEI is lobbying for a new category, one that does not appear anywhere in the directives, whereby the industry selects the sites.

Let us be absolutely clear that what is of concern to us and why we are trying to lock in specific protections and a sustainable approach that is contained in the marine spatial planning directives and the various directives such as the habitats directive, the birds directive and so on is that we have a plan-led approach. That means plans that take into consideration all of the environmental concerns and that the concerns in respect of sustainable and appropriate uses of the marine area should determine where things happen. Our concern is that is not what is going on. What is actually going on is that the industry does not want a plan-led approach and it seems that it is being facilitated in that regard, particularly under this notion of relevant projects. They are getting a special pass. The industry explicitly opposes a plan-led approach. We want this locked into the legislation to apply to all parties. We want it to start with the issue of site selection and go all the way through the process that there is a plan-led approach which is about appropriate development that ensures we protect biodiversity and marine resources and put things where they should be put rather than where developers who are concerned with profit want them. That is the logic behind this. It starts with planning, which is in the EU directives. A proper and appropriate plan-led approach, not a developer-led approach, should be locked in to the whole process from beginning to end. That is our concern. Anyone who reads the comments of WEI will see where our concerns come from.