Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, RISE)
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I would argue that far from us being very lucky to have all these data centres investing here that Ireland and IDA Ireland, which is a part of this and it is nothing personal, are dupes of the big tech companies. The talk of Ireland being a big data superpower is about buttering us up. Ireland is simply a dumping ground for data. It brings very few positives in terms of long-term jobs, with which Mr. Shanahan agrees, even if the number employed in them in the thousands, which is a small number of jobs, and more likely the number is the hundreds. Already 17% of our electricity usage goes on data centres and their water consumption is very high. That is incompatible with meeting our climate target. It points to it being in a completely opposite direction. There is a reason other European countries may have decided not to become the dumping ground for the data of big tech, would Mr. Shanahan agree?