Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

It is nonsense. I ask them to set a vision for the country, as Ken Whitaker did when we switched from being a closed economy to being an open economy. We need to make a similar strategic leap now from being an unsustainable economy, which we are, to being a sustainable one. The Department of Finance should be leading the way because it should understand what is going on the world economy. The election of Donald Trump is the last stand or last gasp of the old fossil fuel era. That is not the future. It is not where investment is going to be.

I thank Deputy Pringle for giving us the opportunity to do this important work on the back of other things this Parliament has done. We passed the anti-fracking Bill on Second Stage. We passed a Bill calling for a referendum on the public ownership of Irish Water on Second Stage. This is an important moment for me and for the Green movement. It is a happy day. It is a victory.

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