Michael Colreavy (Sligo-North Leitrim, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I understand the Minister of State's response, which is in line with what he has said previously. I repeat that we are on the hind foot. I am not blaming the Minister of State or this Government for that. They were handed a poisoned pup. Expressions of interest should never have been requested. Research should have been done before expressions of interest were sought or exploratory licences were granted. The current indecision is facilitating a company to prepare for legal action against this State. When that happens, somebody will stand here - it might be me - to say "I told you this company would do this". We need to acknowledge that those expressions of interest should not have been sought and those exploratory licences should not have been issued. We should ban fracking from the island of Ireland now. We should not let the company put forward the case that we built up its expectations through indecision. That is what we are doing.

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