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

I hope Deputy Micheál Martin does not have his way. He will give me his wounded Corkman look next. Who would disagree with me that in terms of overrunning time, Deputy Martin is in a nervous position? I hope he does not have his way trying to silence smaller parties because I am with Deputy Harty in that we need a diverse and edgy Dáil. In the last two hours I have listened to every single word by people from every party. I have not heard one single person say that one of the challenges we face in this country at this time is how to live differently within our natural world. We need to make a just transition. It offers us an opportunity to bring the social change we need. If we do not do that within Deputy Varadkar's lifetime, the best scientists say the centre of India will not be habitable. It is not just a matter for the Indian people. Hundreds of millions of people from India will have to flee and we will have to manage that migration and the security problems that come with it. It will be replicated in many different places. We have listened for two hours and no one has mentioned it as something worthy of consideration as we set out the challenges any new Taoiseach has.

I am afraid we will not be able to vote for Deputy Varadkar as Taoiseach. We wish him the best and we will work politely with him but we cannot vote for him. He is too right wing. Despite all the pilates, Frappuccinos, skinny lattes, avocado mash and jogging, there is not a scintilla of green in him that we have seen over the past 20 years. We have known him since he walked through the gate in Trinity and the campaign to become Taoiseach began. Perhaps he can reverse the dictum and the Leo-pard will change his spots. I look to his honourable and proud father with hope. There is a dictum if one is not a socialist at 20, one has no heart; if one is not a conservative at 35, one has no head. I understand from reading the papers that Deputy Varadkar's father tends to vote left. Maybe he will follow his father's example and steer the country and himself in that direction. I am afraid everything we see says the opposite. The leadership election was a clear choice Fine Gael members had between collaborative politics of seeking consensus and competition and standing up for Fine Gael, and between a just society and individual opportunity. Fine Gael Members of the House went with the latter but the party went two thirds to one third the other way. The Deputy realised on the hustings, which I watched from a distance, that he had taken the wrong tack because he turned at the fourth hustings in Cork and was all compassionate conservatism. I hope it is the way he goes. Everything I have seen in my 20 years has been the opposite. The Deputy shadowed me as energy spokesperson when I was energy Minister. He was brilliant at scoring political points but when one looked for the substance behind it, it was not there. His decision to delay the metro was historically the worst ministerial decision I have seen in the past 20 or 30 years. We will all pay for it in the housing and transport crisis we have in the city. It is true, unfortunately, what others say here today that in his time as Minister, Deputy Varadkar was more of a commentator for health than Minister for Health. I agree with the consensus among the Deputies who will not vote for him that the position in social welfare depicting the biggest issue of our day as social welfare fraud was just plain wrong and unfair to the Irish people.

We will work with Deputy Varadkar. We will not vote for him today but we will work with him. We will work with him particularly if he accepts what I said at the start about a just transition to a clean, green economy. Not only do we have to do it because of the existential crisis we face but it delivers better paid and more stable jobs. It also places us correctly in the international co-operation we need in Europe, the UK and America. We have a difficult and changing task in managing our position within the European Union. We cannot be seen as we are at the moment as green laggards.

The other issue that has not been mentioned here today goes back to my very first point. Migration is one of the difficult things on which we have done fairly well to date. Deputy Varadkar is the living proof of it as the son of an Indian migrant. It is very welcome. We have managed it well. Let us not give up on the broad consensus and the fact there is not a single person in this House who plays the right-wing, anti-immigrant card. It is something we should be proud of. Tackling the challenges I am interested in helps us deliver on all the different goals of changing to a just economy, standing up internationally, being seen as good in what we need to do and managing migration which God knows is a tough task. We have to admit to our people it is still a real challenge. As much as we have not allowed that voice into the Irish political system it will still be the real challenge of our time. It needs to start now.

I regret Deputy Ross is not here. He needs to step away from the issue of Stepaside Garda station, as much as my colleague, Deputy Catherine Martin, is pleased to see it happen. He needs to step up to the plate and start investing in a completely different transport system. It is the same with the Minister for Finance, whoever it will be. Our finance system is completely incapable of understanding the new economic shift we need to make. I hope Deputy Varadkar changes his spots. I hope we can work with him if he does. To date, everything he has done has been in the other direction. If he turns to where his father has been we will all work together.

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