Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 25 October 2022

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action

COP27: Discussion

Photo of Richard BrutonRichard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael)
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I thank Mr. McLoughlin for the presentation. Before he came in, he probably heard how loss and damage had only been adopted by one country, Denmark. Is this a new announcement today that it is a key priority for Ireland? We also heard that Irish aid had plateaued in recent years and that we seem to have stalled in moving towards the commitment to €225 million.

It seems to me that the energy crisis provoked by the war in Ukraine has brought new focus on cutting our use of energy in the first place. To what extent can that gain momentum? Probably for the first time ever, the public is listening and there is an opportunity. The EU has set a 10% reduction, which is voluntary, and a 5% reduction at peak use - 10% reduction in gas. The French are talking about sobriety, as they put it. That does not seem to be so much a feature of debate or of Mr. McLoughlin's presentation. Should we not focus in on the lower-hanging opportunities and build the public momentum around those as a precursor to the more challenging changes that we have to make over the next decade?