Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael)

At least one of the Government parties is clear and unequivocal about the issue. My remarks, however, are not necessarily a criticism of the Minister. The situation regarding emissions that he inherited could have been addressed by his Government in a series of different ways in the past five years but it failed to do so. The Kyoto Agreement has been in place for the duration of this and the previous Government, but only token measures were taken. The obvious thing to do once that agreement was signed was to develop the alternative energy sector but it was not done.

It was only when Fine Gael published an energy policy that the Government woke up and said something should be done. Every facet of Government policy was copied from our party . It is a great thing to be copied, it is just a pity the photocopier was not working properly and it missed a couple of pages. We will put that right in due course.

The Government is responsible for the notion that high electricity and gas prices are the answer to emissions, but that is not the case. The economy must continue to grow.

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