Mr. Tom Healy:

The pain involved in the just transition is clearly manifest in communities in the midlands that are affected by these job losses and it is a daunting prospect for people to face Christmas knowing there will be no job there towards the latter end of next year. There are many thousands of jobs beyond that at risk, not just in the sectors we are specifically talking about this evening but also in other areas such as, for example, those connected to the agrifood sector which, as we know, is making a significant contribution to emissions.

There are two points here. One is to deal with the crisis, and it is a jobs crisis and has an effect on the communities involved. There must be a plan to deal with that crisis at a local level with innovative and imaginative alternatives in investment and employment and I can develop some of those points later if the committee wishes. There is a long-term issue where we need to look at the bigger picture. As a country, we have a very high rate of greenhouse gas emissions. That is related to a number of things, one of which is the agriculture sector. It is not just agriculture, per se, but the way we do agriculture.

The second important element to bear in mind is spatial planning and the way in which we do construction and planning in the cities, towns and countryside. There is limited value in increasing the cost of diesel or home heating if, at the same time, we do not invest heavily in both retrofitting and an efficient public transport system. It is not just about getting people in and out of Dublin from the midlands or elsewhere. It is about connecting places like Mullingar, Athlone, Tullamore and Newbridge in order that people do not necessarily have to use cars to get to work or to get from one place to another. That is a very important point on transport. The national development plan is heavily reliant on motorway construction. The underlying assumption is that private car ownership will continue to expand, albeit with a transition to electric vehicles. That is not sustainable. We need to think much more in terms of an efficient and green public transport system fit for the 21st century.

This is the bigger picture. It is a difficult and painful transition. When we use the term just transition, we also mean painful transition and it has distributional and regional implications where some regions are disproportionately affected in the short term. This calls for very difficult decisions and choices and people need to be faced with the evidence and difficulties which will inevitably arise as we need to change our consumption behaviour and patterns of production. Ireland will not solve the global climate crisis but it does need to show moral leadership. What we are discussing here this evening is an example that we are going to see repeated again and again when jobs are lost and communities are impacted.