Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

It seems to be a day to expressd no confidence in the Government, given the motion to be debated later on the Minister for Health, but I have absolutely no confidence in the Government to do anything meaningful to deal with the biggest challenge facing humanity - climate change. Yesterday the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment and the Chairman of the climate inaction committee yet again held hostage a Bill that was supported overwhelmingly in this House last February. The Petroleum and Other Minerals Development (Amendment) (Climate Emergency Measures) Bill 2018 sets out to ban the issuing of further fossil fuel exploration licences off our shores. It seeks to do so because science has long settled on the understanding that, as people who inhabit the planet, we should leave 80% of known, proven reserves of fossil fuels in the ground. There is a widespread movement screaming at governments globally to leave them in the ground. We have seen evidence of this, with young people outside the gates weekly baying at the Government to do something about climate change. We are to see a global strike of schoolchildren on 15 March. To cite one very inspiring school student from Sweden, Greta Thunberg: "I want you to panic." She wants governments to feel the fear young people feel every day of their lives when they wake up because we are stealing their futures, unless we challenge the fossil fuel industry. The Bill would help to contribute to a global movement, not just in Ireland. There is no fooling nature. It understands we are overheating the planet and that we are hurtling towards a global rise in temperature of 2o Celsius. That is why the Bill proposes radical measures to deal with the issue and this House supported it overwhelmingly for it to move to Second Stage. In an act of incredible hypocrisy there is procedural trickery taking place at the climate inaction committee.

This trickery is allowing the Minister of State, Deputy Canney, and the Chairman to vote to hold onto that Bill as if it was their little baby, to keep it hostage, and to not allow it to move forward when they already voted for the motion I put yesterday to lay a report before this House and to allow the Bill to proceed to the select committee in order that everybody can come in and amend and change it. The Bill is about doing something meaningful, courageous and even trailblazing. When the Taoiseach himself has accused us of being laggards when it comes to climate change, why does he not now use his power and instruct his Minister and the Chairman to let the Bill go and to release it so that we can become a leader in climate action instead of a laggard?

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