Brian Stanley (Laois, Sinn Fein)
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Broadly speaking, the people from all sides of the House welcome this substantial Bill which consolidates the existing legislation. There has been talk that legislation is not moving. It is a credit to the officials from the Department of Communications, Climate Action and Environment to bring this legislation forward. We dealt with a Bill with 251 sections.

There are areas that we can improve on during Report Stage, for example on the implementation, environmental protection, the position of local authorities and Revenue to the State. The Bill has been in gestation since 2015 and I hope we can proceed to the remaining Stages in the next couple of weeks.

I commend the officials on the detailed work that has been done on this Bill. We are now progressing this important legislation.