Trevor Sargent (Dublin North, Green Party)

The Green Party also opposes the order for Second Stage of this Bill based on a sincere belief that it is incredibly flawed and its provisions are irresponsible. If the Minister is concerned, as we all are, to ensure that public funds are spent in the most effective way possible, the technology exists to ensure that national monuments are possible to identify at the planning stage before construction. We should focus on avoiding the need, effectively, to bulldoze national monuments rather than facilitating that, which the provisions of this Bill attempt to do.

I ask the Minister to go back to the drawing board and engage in some consultation for a change. Surely he should have learnt a lesson from the e-voting episode, in respect of which considerable taxpayers' money could have been saved. We should all get around the table to ensure that we can best resolve any potential conflicts rather than not doing so and such conflicts needlessly costing more taxpayers' money.

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