Cian O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

The expert report on Traveller accommodation was a cross-party report and there was consensus on it. It is a real missed opportunity not to incorporate those recommendations on the planning side into this Bill. It is five years later so you would expect the Government to incorporate them into this planning Bill, even at this late stage. It had five years to take them on board and work with them. Given that there was cross-party agreement and consensus on it and that it came from the committee, that opportunity really should have been taken. At this late stage, I urge the Minister of State to look at doing that on Report Stage.

On embodied carbon and the demolition of buildings that could and should be reused, renovated or repurposed, the Minister said there was a role for planning authorities and development plans in addressing this issue. It has certainly been my experience that, when councillors bring forward amendments to local authority development plans to try to do those sorts of things, they are told there is no national legislation to back up what they are trying to do and that it is an issue for national legislation and not one for councillors to deal with through development plans. We cannot allow national government to say that some of the most important things we need to do as regards climate change and embodied carbon are for local councillors to deal with, while those councillors are told they are matters for national government and primary legislation. This Bill has 750 pages. Measures to address measuring carbon in the construction process and limiting carbon would not take up a lot of space within that. The most unsustainable practices would not be happening if building projects were subject to what would effectively be carbon budgets. It has been well talked out at this committee that, while it is laudable to aim for net-zero construction of buildings, if we do not look at the entire construction process and the entire life cycle of the building from start to finish, we are only looking at a bit of the picture. With regard to what we need to do on climate change, especially given the substantial amount of emissions from this sector, we need to do this urgently.

Given that this is the main planning Bill for 25 years, since the year 2000, there is no better opportunity to address this very pressing issue. Of course that does not mean there are not other things to be done in other areas as well, but this should certainly be a core part of the Bill. I urge the Minister of State to look at what can be done in that area between now and Report Stage. It is not too late to address this very urgent area.