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

To explain the background to our tabling the amendment, it followed on the earlier Report Stage debate, which we thought would conclude last Wednesday evening. In a sense, Deputy Boyd Barrett did the House some service at that time, if not the people in the Gallery, in terms of having a further extensive debate. We were unable to get to his vote on the issue of whether we should have offshore exploration. We made that point consistently in our contributions on Committee and Report Stages. In effect, it is amending the amendment Deputy Boyd Barrett is putting to widen what he is seeking to achieve, namely, an end to offshore exploration for shale, oil or gas to exclude it to other petroleum licences. That is something we debated at length on Committee and Report Stages and on that basis the amendment is not a surprise. It is different from the debate we have had. I did not expect us to be here this morning. We had hoped the debate would have concluded last Wednesday night but given that Deputy Boyd Barrett in my mind gladly extended this debate to this morning, I wanted to be able to press that point because it is an important issue for our party in terms of the type of offshore exploration he or others might want to see happening.

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