Ciarán Cuffe (Dún Laoghaire, Green Party)

Does the Minister not accept that the extraordinary hypocrisy is more on his side of the House than on ours given that his attempt to wrap the green flag around him is sullied by a burn it or bury it strategy and that his Government has paid little or no attention to any attempt to reduce waste, head towards a zero waste strategy or look at alternative options such as clean filling inert waste? The householder is suffering as a result of the lack of determination on the Government's part to reduce the amount of waste created and to recycle waste. The Government is not determined to examine many innovative approaches adopted in other European countries such as standardised packaging and the promotion of markets in recycled products. The Minister has made a late conversion towards the three R principles and he should get his own house in order first.

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