Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)

I welcome the publication of this report, which was commissioned to respond to the belief that there is widespread concern about the current taxation and licensing arrangements for gas and oil. I certainly believe that when gas and oil are discovered and go into production, the people of this country get next to nothing from it, in effect. In that context, the production of this report by an Oireachtas committee is a welcome development. Although I would go a little beyond what is recommended in the report in a number of areas, frankly, the implementation of the recommendations made by the all-party committee would be a major step in the right direction. The Minister should take them seriously. One of the reasonable points made in the report is that oil prices are likely to stay on their current upward trajectory, which means that oil companies' interest in exploration will increase over time. Ireland is a relatively politically stable place compared to many of the other locations where exploration might be considered and is therefore attractive from that point of view. Crucially, technological innovation in the area of locating and extracting gas and oil reserves has improved dramatically and consequently some of the obstacles that might previously have discouraged gas and oil companies are not problems to the same extent they used to be. In that context, Deputies from all parties have recommended we should increase the tax take significantly. I do not see why the Minister would resist this. It is probably not so many years since he would have been one of those shouting loudest for there being a significant benefit to the public from our gas and oil reserves. For that reason, he should implement these recommendations, as a minimum step towards ensuring the people of this country gain some benefit from our oil and gas reserves rather than giving them away to private companies.

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