David Cullinane (Waterford, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

In the absence of any real development on Brexit, the big news emanating from the European Council last week was the regrettable failure of Heads of Government to find unanimous support in working towards a target of net zero carbon emissions across the European Union by 2050. That is very worrying. While the House might disagree on how Ireland will achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2050, the vast majority of Members at least agree that we have to get there, that climate change must be tackled and that we are way behind where we need to be in tackling the problem. That is not just the position in this state, it is also the situation across the European Union. Why is there such reluctance to tackle the issue at European level? Why has the Taoiseach's party's own group in the European Parliament voted consistently against Europe-wide climate action measures, including binding renewable energy targets? The failure to set direct, goal-based, binding targets for member states means that many countries, including Ireland, have simply not bothered to put in the effort required to meet targets. They know that they can just buy credits to avoid non-compliance. It is estimated that we will spend upwards of €7 billion from 2020 to 2040 to buy our way out of missing our emissions targets. That is bonkers. It is bonkers money which equates to three times the cost of the national children's hospital. It requires a serious rethink at European Council level and in the European Parliament. It is incumbent on the Taoiseach as Head of Government to outline the Government's approach in that regard.

The Mercosur trade deal has been raised with the Taoiseach a number of times today in the House. It is important to raise it with him again in the context of the European summit. I noted with interest the contents of the joint letter the Taoiseach sent to the European Commission last week with the President of France, the Polish Prime Minister and the Belgian Prime Minister to outline their concerns about the proposed Mercosur trade deal. The time for writing letters on the issue has long passed. My colleague Matt Carty, MEP, has called on the Taoiseach repeatedly to withdraw his support for the deal in recognition of the impact it would have on Irish agriculture. We had a great deal of debate on the matter in the Oireachtas in the context of the report of the all-party committee on climate change which looked at how we could do more to reduce carbon emissions and transition from a high to a low carbon economy. There is no doubt that there are challenges in every sector, inlcuding agriculture, in the transition to a low carbon economy, but farmers in Ireland are up for the challenge. In many ways, they have led the way in transitioning to a more green economy. One of the things of which we are all proud in this country is that we do farming very well. If one takes beef production under the family farm model in Ireland as an example, cattle graze and are fed on grass and we do not have a proliferation of the factory farms one sees in many parts of the European Union. It is the type of farming that is best and that we do well. We produce some of the best beef in the world. It is of high quality. It is the type of farming that serves the country well. I come from the south east and it certainly serves that region very well. We are all very proud of the high levels of productivity but also the high standards of Irish farmers not just in the beef sector but also in the dairy sector, as well as others.

The difficulty with the Mercosur trade deal is that we could end up signing up to a deal which would mean huge amounts of beef being imported into the European Union, even into Ireland if farmers here were forced to reduce their productivity. In many cases in South America, rain forests are being cut down to facilitate the farming sector. It would be ironic in the extreme if Irish farmers were told that they would have to do a great deal more, which they accept and for which they are up, in particular, where it would mean a reduction in beef production, while at the same time beef would be imported from other parts of the world which did not operate to the same standards, certainly environmental standards. That would be self-defeating and would defeat the purpose of what we are doing. It would be very bad for Ireland. That is why we have concerns about the deal. The European Commission is intent on offering a tariff-free EU quota of 99,000 tonnes of Brazilian beef a year. How many trees will be cut down to facilitate its production? What quantity of rain forests will have to go?

Other sectors are at risk too, including the poultry sector, from the deal, in which I do not see the positives for Ireland. Certainly, the farmers I have met in County Waterford and the wider south east do not see the positives. The deal is being pursued solely in the interests of German car manufacturers. Why then is the Taoiseach playing with words, rather than putting his foot down to stop the deal? Writing letters is not enough. Expressing concern is not enough. It is incumbent on the Government and the Opposition to take the same approach as we took to Brexit, namely, having a clear and unanimous Irish position on protecting the interests of the economy and Irish farmers and doing what is in the best interests of the people of this country.

I refer to Brexit. Since the Taoiseach last made a pre-Council statement, the field of Tory leadership contenders has been whittled down to two. I do not have a particular grá for either candidate or their politics, given the party from which they come. Both have stated their intention to ditch the withdrawal agreement and that they are fine with the prospect of a no-deal scenario. The real danger is that we will see a great deal more of what we have seen in the past two years with Mrs. Theresa May and I said as much in pre-Council statements. We went through a tortuous two-year process during which all sorts of make-believe solution were put on the table by politicians in Britain, sometimes with the acquiescence of the Prime Minister because she was playing to different factions in her party. As a result, we lost vital time in dealing with magic solutions. It must be made very clear to both contenders and whoever wins that the withdrawal agreement and the Irish backstop are sacrosanct and that we cannot go through two more years of the nonsense we have seen. Whoever wins the Tory leadership contest and becomes Prime Minister of the United Kingdom will have to deal with the fact that there is no majority in Parliament for a hard crash. That is the simple arithmetic. There is no appetite for and there are not the numbers in the British Parliament to support a hard crash. That must inform the thinking of the new Prime Minister, as well as the thinking of the European Commission and the Government.

I heard what the Taoiseach said recently about the backstop before and after the Council meeting. It was very strong and forceful. He reiterated what was necessary from an Irish perspective, namely, that while there may be scope to discuss the political declaration, the debate on the withdrawal agreement cannot be reopened. That would be in no one's interests, including those of the British Government. It is done. It took two years of very painful negotiations and was a compromise. We must be very clear in expressing our position to any incoming British Prime Minister that we can no longer indulge them with fantasies or what they call existing technologies which do not exist or solutions they say can be put in place but that do not exist.

That is the position on Brexit, but we have to wait and see what happens in the Tory leadership election which is not a matter for anybody in this House. The Tory Party will decide in due course who its leader will be. The new Prime Minister will have to deal with the Taoiseach, this state and party leaders in the North. We will deal constructively with whoever that person is as we focus on the need to get the institutions in the North up and running again. We want the ongoing talks to work and succeed in order that we can get to a place where people's rights can be vindicated and previous agreements made can be implemented. We have to ensure the voice coming from the North - it is a majority voice coming from Sinn Féin, the SDLP, the Alliance Party, the Green Party and all those not in favour of Brexit or a hard border - is heard. We have to ensure the false and fantasy solutions being regurgitated by the two contenders do not gain any traction whatsoever. We have a great deal of work to do. I ask the Taoiseach to continue to hold the line on the issue of the Irish backstop as forcefully as he has been doing. I urge him to continue to protect the withdrawal agreement which people fought hard to negotiate.

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