Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael)

Our motion tonight, with which nobody can argue except on petty party political grounds, calls for a sea change in how the State does its business and treats the environment. Fine Gael tonight calls for the setting of a target for a reduction in CO2 emissions from each Department and State agency. This would follow from a complete audit of each agency or Department's carbon footprint and an analysis of what can be done to reduce it.

I welcome very much the e-government initiative and hope it can be furthered. I see no reason, for example, that every citizen in the State should not be allowed to join a system that would allow them to receive all correspondence from State bodies via e-mail rather than in a letter. My experience with the county council and local authorities in County Louth in this regard has been very good and the level of effective official e-mail and Internet usage is high. The Health Service Executive and other State bodies are also doing this and it represents the way forward. It is particularly helpful to get a quick answer to a query that can be passed on to a constituent by e-mail. There may be specific instances when a letter must be sent, but an e-mail could replace 90% of what we receive from the Government.

I recently tabled a parliamentary question on the amount the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government spends on the production of bilingual communications and found that the figure was €160,000 last year. I did not receive a breakdown of the figure in the Minister's letter, and I presume people must be paid to write and translate, but it seems that if €160,000 is spent on bilingual publications, we should make large cutbacks in the level of printing.

Now that we have an option to receive this material by e-mail, we should stop printing copies of the Order Paper and other documents. Members' efforts to make greater use of computers have fallen by the wayside and we must address the problem.

Private industry is doing good work in the area of e-mail. Allied Irish Bank, for example, has allowed its customers to accept e-statements for their bank and credit card accounts. If bank customers can receive important financial information, State services must be able to find a better way to provide information. The example of AIB may have a lesson for Eircom which sends out two bulky telephone books every year. In an era of competitive directory inquiry services, I suspect telephone books are used with less and less frequency. While questions may arise concerning data protection, Eircom should circulate a default CD-ROM.

The motion calls on the Government to lead by example on environmental issues by adopting a policy of green procurement. This approach is exactly as it appears in that it requires green thinking in the procurement of green cars, recycled paper and so forth.

The motion also calls on the State to begin the conversion of all public buildings to green energy. Such a policy would be of major benefit to the environment and, not least, the fledgling renewable energy sector, which needs a boost. The motion would also compel the State to begin converting all public service vehicles to biofuels to reduce its carbon footprint. While I acknowledge that some work has begun in these areas, what is lacking is a concerted cross-departmental approach which would move beyond incrementalism and small steps and lead to an environmental "Great Leap Forward" that would, in time, result in every Government agency sourcing it electricity from wind, wave or solar energies.

Crucially, the Fine Gael Party is asking the House to support the introduction a new system of annual open and transparent reporting, which would ensure every Government agency is held to account every year on its progress. On so many issues the House lacks the power to properly scrutinise what the Government does, with legislation rushed through, regulators used as an excuse to duck ministerial responsibility and so forth. Under our proposals, the Dáil and Seanad would hold the Government accountable for delivering or failing to deliver on the actions I have described. Fine Gael envisages that an annual report would be presented and debated in the Oireachtas. Crucially, the relevant Ministers — perhaps even the Taoiseach — would be made to answer questions on how and why they had failed and what they intended to do about it.

My party wants the Government to take action on climate change by adopting a strategy that works, rather than adopting three ineffective climate change strategies, as the Government has done. Young people are deeply concerned about the Government's failure to address this issue. Fine Gael has proposed approaches that, I hope, we will soon be in a position to implement. We will publicly, openly and transparently state what we intend to do. We have established policy in all areas of the environment, including the vital energy issue. My colleagues will articulate these views presently. Tonight we are discussing procurement. I ask the Minister and his colleagues on the Government benches to do the decent thing and support us.

See this speech in context