Dáil debates

Wednesday, 27 May 2020

Covid-19 (Taoiseach): Statements

 

3:00 pm

Photo of Denis NaughtenDenis Naughten (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

First, I hope the Taoiseach and the other groups in this House can join with me in recognising that today is international Emergency Medicine Day. The response of all our medical staff during the pandemic, and particularly those at the front of house, has been exceptional. The Covid-19 crisis has shown the entire country how we should do things and how we should not. The greatest tribute we could all pay to our medical staff is to ensure that we do not go back to overwhelmed and overcrowded emergency departments with trolleys on the corridors.

I welcome the publication of the just transition commissioner's report and the resulting discussions at Cabinet last week but we need to see talk and promises converted into real and practical action to deliver immediate jobs within the communities right across the midland countries now. Every time we hear of just transition, we are always one more announcement away from action. We cannot accept a situation where we must wait for Covid-19 restrictions to be lifted or the next budget cycle before we see action on the ground. We do not have the luxury of time. We must see action now because 360 families depend on a peat harvest this summer and, sadly, there is no guarantee that peat harvesting will be allowed pending the complex planning process that Bord na Móna must go through.

I also echo the call of the just transition commissioner, Mr. Kieran Mulvey, that it is imperative that the €11 million just transition fund announced last October would be used this year to stimulate and finance projects that have employment potential and that can contribute to the economic, social and environmental sustainability of the region. This must be in a manner that complements other sources of public funding available to the region. Mr. Mulvey went on to say that the funds needed to be made available as quickly as possible for allocation to selected projects.

On 23 July last, I wrote to the Taoiseach requesting as an immediate measure that €30 million from the climate action fund should be ring-fenced to commence the work of rehabilitating the cutaway bogs - work that must be carried out on these bogs regardless of the future of peat harvesting. The front-loading of this work was to be carried out over the 15-year period but would provide security of employment for the 360 Bord na Móna staff at this anxious time, as well as reducing peat oxidation and carbon loss on our bogs. On 9 September, the Taoiseach wrote back to me to say that funding the rehabilitation of cutaway bogs from the climate action fund should form part of the solution.

Bord na Móna has a landholding of just under 200,000 acres across the country.

While some of these lands may be considered for new commercial uses, such as the growing of herbs, other lands will naturally return to nature. As a result, there is a considerable land bank, where peat extraction has already ceased, that would flood naturally and where work on rehabilitation can start. This work would include the provision of recreational facilities such as walking and cycling trails, which would be less than two hours' travel from Leinster House.

As the Taoiseach knows, the decision has already been taken, as part of Project Ireland 2040, to develop a 35,000-acre national wetlands park on the Mount Dillon bog complex in counties Roscommon and Longford. A further example of the opening up of bogland for public access is the Ballinasloe parkland project, which would utilise the cutaway bogs outside the town of Ballinasloe. It is envisaged that it will form part of the Dublin–Galway greenway.

Public access alone is already attracting over 50,000 visitors a year to Mount Lucas in County Offaly. Two hundred and seventy days after the Taoiseach’s letter to me, the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment, Deputy Bruton, has announced that work on the advanced rehabilitation of these peatlands is "subject to further Government consideration". Again, we are another announcement away from action. Not a single cent has been spent on rehabilitating these bogs, nor has a single cent from the just transition fund been allocated for alternative employment in the region, yet we are quite happy to borrow money on the back of every citizen in this country to subsidise the wages of Bord na Móna staff or pay them unemployment benefits at a cost of approximately €65,000 every week, forcing them to sit at home although the rehabilitation work will have to be done regardless of the future of peat harvesting.

I have a number of questions. First, I want a commitment from the Taoiseach that the funds will be released immediately, in line with his commitment last September, to re-employ Bord na Móna staff currently laid off to commence the rehabilitation of State-owned and State-controlled bogs. Second, I want a commitment that the National Oil Reserves Agency, NORA, amendment legislation to provide moneys for the climate action fund will be agreed by the Cabinet and ready for publication within seven days of the formation of the new Government, and that it will ensure part of the fund will be ring-fenced for projects across the midland counties. Third, will the Taoiseach confirm that the Government has received the €5 million committed by the ESB for the just transition fund, and will he provide me with the date that moneys from the €11 million just transition fund will be allocated for shovel-ready projects that can create jobs now, not in ten years' time?

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