Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Up to last year, we could not use construction wood waste in this State. We could be shipping some over the Border, however. It is allowed to be used in that jurisdiction. I ask the Department to look at that area. It does not make sense that we cannot use material from another jurisdiction, particularly when there is a large construction sector here at the moment. That should be used in terms of a supply of biomass. It does not make sense. Industry representatives - people who are trying to increase the use of biomass - have raised that issue with me.

I will make a point about Bord na Móna and the ESB. We are lucky to have them. I know people have a big issue with the profit made by the ESB in the first six months of the year. It is not going to disappear. It is there because we owned it. The profit will be reinvested or there will be a big dividend. That is for the Minister as it is a matter of policy on Government clawback, etc. That is in place. Bord na Móna is trying to get into, and isin, the process. It has gone from a company on which the gate was nearly closed to what it is today. It had to pay a dividend. Taxpayers need to hear that it paid a small dividend to the State last year. It has the potential to do an awful lot of this heavy lifting for us. All I will say - again, it will be a policy matter - is that from an official point of view, the Departments of the Environment, Climate and Communications and Public Expenditure and Reform, etc., should give Bord na Móna a wide berth. It took out a one-page advertisement for jobs recently in the local press in the midlands. That is some change from where it was a couple of years ago when the gate was nearly locked. I want to acknowledge that. I know that perhaps the Department's officials sometimes did not get credit for the work they did. We criticise them sometimes but I want to acknowledge that. That took a lot of work. Many pieces had to be moved around.