Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Tuesday, 4 December 2018
Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach
African Development (Bank and Fund) Bill 2018: Committee Stage
2:00 pm
Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein)
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The amendment tabled by Deputy Eamon Ryan chimes with my contribution in this respect to the debate on Second Stage. It related to the need for the agreement to be stronger, for example, in the context of environmental protection and human rights. The question I asked at the time was what structures were in place to monitor the human rights and due diligence of companies that would be beneficiaries of this fund. That is still not known to us. Also, focus needs to be put on the issue of renewable energy technologies to help address the issues in terms of climate change and the particular specific needs of African countries. While this amendment has been ruled out of order and I am not challenging that, it tried to capture some of those issues, which I will seek to consider on Report Stage. I would appreciate a response to those issues regarding environmental protection, human rights and climate change.