Professor Hannah Daly:

As the Deputy said, we have provided the evidence in the four volumes both the urgency to act on climate change, the evidence as it exists and the co-benefits that climate action can bring. There is limited research on how to bring all that evidence to the public to mobilise support.

I share the Deputy's alarm at how people, especially on social media, and how it is tied up with national movements across Europe, oppose immigration or view climate change as a conspiracy. The evidence shows that the vast majority of Irish people believe that climate change is real, has been caused by human activities and they say at least that they support climate action. The big challenge is to counter the narratives that climate actions are costly and miserable by bringing all the evidence to the public and mainstreaming it everywhere. I say that because for every Facebook post that shows how bad EVs are, there is no counter to say how beneficial they are. It is framed in the media largely as a political issue and, therefore, a division between political parties, rather than something that affects every aspect of life.

I will give another example, although the research on it is limited. If we had taken these energy transition measures before the invasion of Ukraine, the energy crisis and the cost-of-living crisis then people would have been far more insulated from the cost-of-living crisis. If houses had been insulated, if we had a good public transport network and if we had more renewables on the system, we would not have had the same cost-of-living crisis and suffered all the associated negative consequences. Those indirect complexities are not linked in people's minds because energy and greenhouse gas pollution are invisible.

My last reflection is on what we can draw from previous successful campaigns. Personal testimonies of the people who were affected played a very important role in the success of the repeal the eighth campaign and, therefore, it would be important to bring to bear the testimony of people who are affected by climate change or benefited from climate action measures.