Ciarán Cuffe (Dún Laoghaire, Green Party)

I feel strongly on this issue and I respect your judgment. We need to make radical changes now. That is what Sir Nicholas Stern is telling us to do and the Minister is misquoting him for his own purpose by suggesting that carbon trading is fine. Yes, it is in the short term but not in the long term. What the Minister is doing is committing the Irish taxpayer to forking out €270 million to buy our way out of our Kyoto obligations. That is not good enough and we need to put an end to it and, as Deputy Gilmore pointed out, we need to have closure rather than an open cheque book or a standing order year after year for the Irish taxpayer.

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