Mr Ken Stockil:

On the Deputy's point, I will first give some background on the water stewardship programme the sustainable enterprise skillnet has developed and delivered over recent years in collaboration with Uisce Éireann. The genesis of this programme lies in one of the compact-type initiatives the Deputy has referred to, Water Stewardship Ireland. It was originally funded by the Environmental Protection Agency to establish a network of large water users across Ireland to look at the issue of water. It is a valuable resource. It is sometimes underestimated in our national psyche but, internationally, it is seen as a very important part of this dialogue. People say that, if climate change is a shark, water is its teeth. Many of these organisations, more than 300, came together to form a collaborative platform to look at that challenge. Since then, with the support of Skillnet Ireland and Uisce Éireann, a systemised programme to upskill and develop action plans for the individual organisations was brought to fruition. That was launched three years ago. The committee has details of the levels of engagement with that programme but, to round out the point, a number of those organisations, having started with this catalyst programme to understand the challenges and come up with specific actions plans that can be audited and verified, subsequently went to get certified platinum under international standards such as the Alliance for Water Stewardship global standard. They have achieved positions in the top six or seven globally with regard to that challenge. That has given us an insight into what is required here.

On the broader sustainability challenge, we have to be cognisant that the corporate sustainability reporting directive, CSRD, is now emerging as a significant driver for many large business and that, over the coming years, that will trickle down to the small to medium-sized businesses that support those larger organisations or which are in their supply chains. We are seeing that framework being very helpful in that dialogue with companies in that it breaks down the environmental and social pillars into accessible blocks and allows companies to develop tangible action plans. Our sustainability leaders programme under the climate ready academy is specifically anchored in that narrative. It aligns with the UN global compact and the undertakings companies are asked to sign up to under that compact but distils it down to the local context. It looks at initiatives like Origin Green and the ecosystem of supports in Ireland and translates that global compact into a national compact so that companies can sign up to a sustainability leaders programme, which is now delivered in collaboration with Enterprise Ireland and the IDA to their client bases. That is exactly the type of collective action required here. It has to be about big-ticket initiatives and collaborative and collective action because the challenge is immense. Decarbonisation is a significant portion of that but there are other significant complexities and portions of that dialogue that need to happen with companies over the coming years.

That is what we have attempted to do on that front for both water and broader sustainability.