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

I agree with Deputy Cronin. The former President, Mrs. Mary Robinson, said something similarly where she said, "You can't negotiate with science." That last-minute change in the wording about shutting down coal was politically gut-wrenching, as I said at the time.

I would make two or three points. First, every single country in the earlier session had said that we had to go for 1.5°C. For those countries, India and China, we had something of a ringside seat for what was a fairly eventful three hours of haggling because our seat was right beside China's. We saw the president of the COP, Mr. Sharma MP, and the Americans and everyone coming backwards and forwards. China and India are at risk more than any other countries from climate change. Years ago, I went to the Potsdam Institute to see the 4°C world, which was an assessment by the institute which was brilliant on climate meteorology. You could see that the centre of India was not habitable in a 4°C world.

They will have to switch from using coal. The only question is when. While it was deeply disappointing and took much of the shine off the final agreement, it should not take from what has been a step change in the recognition across the world that we need to do this. Saudi Arabia and Russia said nothing. There may have been 500 fossil fuel campaigners at the conference, but everyone agrees increasingly that fossil fuels will have to be history. It is just a matter of how quickly we can make the switch. It is just to give people some hope. That wording was in the political part of the text, not in the legal structures the Paris Agreement has to deliver.

The Chinese and Indian approach is because they are under a similar perspective in that they have to, as they see it, protect and provide for their populations. They are not doing it the right way by continuing with coal, but we have to be careful about depicting other countries in some ways. We need to look at our own switch-off from coal and deliver that first and foremost.

With regard to the just transition here, the Deputy is right that the vast majority of people on low incomes cannot afford to buy electric vehicles. We cannot be pushing people or making them feel guilty if they are driving fossil fuel cars in the interim. We will not win this by shaming people. We have to make sure that the cost comes down in a way that makes these vehicles affordable and makes it easy for people-----