Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

The group of amendments cover quite a few different themes.

My amendments Nos. 26 and 27 relate to the just transition principles and I will not discuss them again.

Amendment No. 29 talks about the committee and its membership that will be established by the Minister. There is not a huge amount of detail as to extent of the committee and its role. I ask the Minister to use the Public Appointments Service process for this committee and, indeed, any committee that the Minister seeks to establish for the purpose of advising on specific issues like this one. My amendment outlines some of the things that I believe should be taken into consideration such as gender, expertise and expresses the need for the process to be a public and transparent one.

Amendment No. 37 seeks to insert the provision that funds "will be ringfenced for the Circular Economy Fund". We need to make sure that all funds are ring-fenced and it is an issue that concerns the carbon tax. I mean that the discourse at the moment is that all of the carbon tax money goes towards climate initiatives but it is not. Therefore, we need to specify that the money that goes into this will be ring-fenced for the purpose of the circular economy fund.

Amendment No. 67 seeks to insert a definition for just transition. Now is the time to recognise that the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development Act 2015 or this Bill should have incorporated the just transition principles and we should use this opportunity to incorporate those principles into the Act now.