Gerry Adams (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Before last Christmas, the UN panel of climate change experts concluded that humankind is to blame for global warming and warned that the planet will see increasingly extreme weather as events unfold, unless Governments take strong action. In its report the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that the world is ill-prepared for the risks arising from a changing climate. It also warned that many states could expect more frequent storms and flooding. That certainly has been the experience here. We are all very familiar with what happened particularly in the Shannon river catchment area, where homes were totally destroyed by floodwaters. The same thing happened in my constituency, in Louth, particularly in Dundalk. I have maintained contact with the families involved since, and they face a winter filled with dread. They are angry, they are concerned and they tell me that flood defences have not been constructed and that their homes and businesses have no more protection now than they had last year. I therefore ask the Taoiseach to outline the Government's proposal for this coming winter and winter 2017 and whether local authorities have been allocated additional interim funding to undertake preventative work until the CFRAM flood defences are complete. Many of these will not be complete - in fact, to my knowledge, very few of them will be complete - before midsummer of next year.

This week the world entered a new era of climate change reality. We are told that the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has reached a symbolic threshold of 400 parts per million across the globe. In this context it is imperative that the Paris Agreement, which commits countries to keeping temperature rises to well below 2° Celsius, enter into force.

The Minister, Deputy Naughten, has said he wants to secure Dáil ratification of the Paris agreement before the next UN global summit on climate change to be held in November. How confident is the Taoiseach that can be achieved? Is the Government committed to the full implementation of the Paris agreement?

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