Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Minister should come on. I thought he was more fair-minded than that. There is an opportunity for him to lay the plan before the Oireachtas in order that the Dáil can scrutinise it. That is our role. When I was elected by the people of Laois-Offaly, that is what they sent me here to do. Opposition Members need to have an input into these plans. The Minister is keeping the Opposition outside the tent unnecessarily on this issue; he is pushing the Opposition outside the door. He can shake his head all he likes but that is what he is doing. He has an opportunity, particularly through amendment No. 52, to allow that to happen. He has nothing to fear and everything to gain from laying the plan before the Dáil and allowing a debate for a few hours on it. Let us consider some of the issues that have been debated in the House over the past four and a half years. Long evenings and nights have been spent on obscure issues that, perhaps, were not that important.

A national mitigation plan is hugely important. The issue of climate change will be a matter for life and death; it will be a matter of survival for some coastal areas. We have witnessed the effects of rising sea levels along the west coast. We also witnessed the negative effects of climate change on agriculture in recent years, following extreme weather patterns, which were damaging. This is an important issue and I represent those people the same as the Minister. It is important that the Minister addresses this and I ask him to accept this amendment.

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