Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

Where is the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment? We are discussing a very important environmental Bill and the process surrounding it but the Minister is not here. The senior Ministers of the Government are not here. Do they understand the growing sentiment among people on the issue? Do they understand the powerful sentiment growing among the young generation on this issue? The Government has tried to round up its Senators to block the Bill and to block the Dáil from debating it, notwithstanding the fact that those Senators will have an opportunity to discuss it in the Seanad. They are trying to use the rules and the process against the spirit of the situation which demands a proper debate on these crucial issues. I support the Petroleum and Other Minerals Development (Amendment) (Climate Emergency Measures) Bill 2018 and the banning of exploration for fossil fuels. Ireland should become the fourth country in the world to take that step.

To see why it is wrong to use the process to block the Bill, one need only look at what has been happening in Mozambique in recent times. The United Nations describes what has been happening there as the single worst weather disaster in the history of the southern hemisphere. The country's former education Minister, Graça Machel, says the destruction of the city of Beira will go down in history as the first time a city was completely devastated by climate change. There are things we can do. We can pass the Bill and take other measures. Recently, bus fares were cut in the city of Cork for a period of six weeks from €2.40 to €1 as a concession to the local traders' lobby which said trade had been cut as a result of partial pedestrianisation and a car ban on the city's main street, Patrick Street. While it was a modest measure and extremely limited in time, we are getting reports that public transport use increased by 8% while it was in place. Further, the increased level of use has largely held since the measure was reversed and the fare was put back up to €2.40. It raises the question of what would happen if public transport were made completely free, not just for six weeks but indefinitely. What if we followed the example of Estonia, Luxembourg and 100 other cities around the world? We would see a major increase in the use of public transport which is precisely the alternative to the car that we need. Free public transport would cost the State €600 million per annum.

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