Ms Sharon Finegan:

I thank the Senator for those questions. The first question related to just transition as part of the response to Covid-19.

One of the commitments in the programme for Government is around the development of a new national economic plan and work is ongoing on that with my colleagues in the Department of the Taoiseach. Future-proofing the economy and society is a key element of the work that needs to be done in considering how best to frame that. Just transition is crucial in that respect and my colleagues, in developing the plan, will be mindful of the commitments in the programme for Government around establishing the just transition commissioner as a statutory office, publishing the just transition plan and publishing a detailed all-of-Government implementation plan consistent with the recommendations of the just transition commissioner's first report.

There are a number of commitments in the programme for Government that are important in this space and will ensure that the response to Covid-19 will consider just transition an important part of where we go next. We saw signs of that in the July stimulus package and the outline of budget 2021. These were key considerations in some of the expenditure that was committed to for budget 2021 in the area of climate. That is what I say about that.

In response to the question about failure and where responsibility lands, the important thing about identifying failures where targets have not been met is around transparency and making sure there is a clearer understanding when policies that we intend to deliver are not implemented. The climate action plan process and the publication of detailed implementation reports show, in a detailed way, what has been done, what has not been done, why it has not been done and what progress has been made. This is crucial. We have taken a very transparent approach to all of the work on the climate action plan. I encourage people to have a look at those reports because they are very detailed and provide real insights into what has happened to date.

When we talk about failure, we are talking about whether our greenhouse gas emissions will reduce. One of the key problems in terms of conceptually bringing people along, or allowing them to understand what is happening on climate action, is that people can feel a disconnect between knowing whether greenhouse gas emissions are reducing and how the fulfilment of Government policy delivers on their actions. Deputy Bruton was alive to that when he was the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment. He was keen to develop a climate action dashboard so that we are not relying solely on the annual inventories from the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, to show us if we are making progress. Those inventories come out annually and are a lagging indicator so one never quite knows whether one is making progress. As part of the work we have been doing, we have developed a climate action dashboard that is available at gov.ie/climateaction. It shows our progress against the key targets in the climate action plan. I envisage that we will continue to do that under the new climate action plan. That makes it more understandable for a lay reader. If there is a target of 500,000 retrofits over a particular period of time, the dashboard can show how well we are doing on that and how likely we are to succeed. That makes it more understandable for the public, increases transparency and makes it more obvious to people how policies make a difference, which is hugely important.

On the question of where the measures will come from, the Deputy is right in saying that the current climate action plan will, if fully implemented, deliver a 3.5% reduction in emissions whereas the commitment in the programme for Government is for a 7% reduction, which is a significant step up. Answering the question as to where those measures come from is going to be the subject of intense work by Government Departments over the coming period in order to be able to produce a plan that lays out policies to deliver that 7%. It is a challenging target, no doubt, but that ambition is crucial because that is where we need to go. Professor Anderson has clearly outlined the scientific evidence which supports the need for greater action more quickly. That work is under way or beginning in Departments for the next iteration of the climate action plan, which will seek to provide a whole suite of new measures to bring us to that 7%.