Dr. Geraldine Brennan:

Speaking in a personal capacity rather than on behalf of my members, the balance between carrot and stick is important. I commend the Department of Environment, Climate and Communications and the EPA on engaging with Climate-KIC and CIRCULÉIRE. This is the first public private partnership where they sit on the steering group with industry members who reflect back the challenges they are facing with a view to creating dialogue so it becomes a collaborative approach to navigating the unknowns and the challenges that come ahead. Our industry members, if I can speak on their behalf, understand that regulatory obligations serve a purpose to ensure good practice in industry. I do not think there is a problem with thatper se. It is about having that constructive dialogue.

Something we included in our submission to the Department of Environment, Climate and Communications was around more anticipatory regulatory approaches which involve help desks. In Denmark, for example, they have a business desk that is a free service which allows companies to say there is a regulatory thing they are unclear about, ask for help and find out if they are falling foul of it before they set foot. There are ways public money can be used to support. For our industry members, it is about de-risking that initial toe in the water, not necessarily the scale-up. When it comes to capex infrastructure of the order of tens of millions, it is a different story, but when we are talking about piloting a take-back scheme, we are not talking about millions. CIRCULÉIRE's innovation fund for three years is €1.5 million. Regarding the numbers needed to accelerate and get people out the gates, I in my professional capacity think they are worth the investment.