John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I echo what Deputy Farrell said about the attendance of the Minister for the duration of the debate. It is something I would have expected of him given his interest and certainly, like myself, he was a very regular attender at the Oireachtas Committee on Climate Action in the previous Dáil.

Seven or eight months ago, we would not have thought there was something incongruous about speaking with such gusto about climate action in the midst of Covid. The pandemic is a priority and people's minds are rightly focused on the issues facing us as opposed to the issues facing the planet and yet we recall, as though it were from a different lifetime, the early days of Covid when everybody went into their gardens and they were digging and planting. We could hear birdsong in the cities and towns. I remember getting a scent in the air that I had not experienced since I was a young boy and it evoked a whole load of memories. There was a great uplift of spirits when we thought Covid was going to last just a couple of weeks and we could adapt our lives with the learning we had from the weeks of lockdown. Those weeks of lockdown were instructive in terms of giving people hope and enabling people to see what quality of life is like, not only with their children and grandchildren but with nature, and that we do not have to travel to live a full life and have experiences through all the senses because they are all around us. We are blessed to have such a beautiful country in this regard. Even in the constituency I represent, people are 30 seconds from the hills and mountains and 15 minutes from the sea. Everybody in Dublin South-West is a matter of minutes from the mountains and the great resource they are.

I cannot help bring to mind the generation of those aged 20 and upwards. Those aged 25 were born just before the first crash and they lived through it. Those who are a little older saw their families suffer the consequences of global recession. Covid has come and they are living with it. They should be our priority because, to use their language, many of them have suffered the embarrassment and humiliation of having to return home to live with their parents and give up their independent lives and the ability to travel, explore, see the world and carve out an independent future for themselves. We will probably face a further global recession. On top of this, they also carry the burden of climate action, which is a considerable burden for a generation. Climate action on its own is heavy and weighty, never mind the existence of a pandemic and the budgetary and fiscal situation facing the country, although, following the First World War and the Spanish flu the east coast of the United States went through the roaring 20s for seven or eight years and then hit the darkest depression that has ever hit anybody. This generation needs minding, not in terms of cosseting but in terms of prioritising their future. I am 55 and climate action is having some degree of impact on my life but it does not look like it will have anything like as dramatic an impact on the life of my generation as it will on those coming behind us.

The climate action Bill has been mentioned throughout the afternoon. It deals with the big ticket items. There is no point in repeating what has been said and there will be other occasions to speak about it.

The Minister is familiar with the fact that a couple of Dublin local authorities took incredible, positive advantage of the fact we had a lockdown and implemented measures such as cycle tracks and pedestrian measures which they had been attempting to do for years. They did it under the cover of darkness but everybody applauded. They have been widely and positively received. Some were not as proactive as others. My local authority, South Dublin County Council, was not as proactive but Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council and Dublin City Council deserves to be applauded for what it is doing.

On the Minister's desk is a review carried out by his predecessor on e-scooters. I would love a decision on them. A very climate action friendly move could be made along the lines of the city bikes scheme, not to throw it open to everybody but to have a system where speed could be controlled, safety could be regulated and parking could be remotely monitored using the latest technology.

Electric bikes are becoming popular and there is a promise in the programme for Government that they would be covered by the cycle to work scheme. That is fine but it still means people have to shell out quite a few quid. Electric bikes are not cheap but it is really exciting technology. As the Minister knows, in Belgium employers receive 125% tax relief on any e-bike measure they introduce in the workspace. These measures could be used to purchase e-bikes for their employees, to purchase equipment such as bicycle shelters or to construct shower facilities in the workplace. It covers any investment made in e-bike technology. Employers must demonstrate the employees have foregone their cars and are using the e-bike as a way of commuting to work. Some employees in Belgium are paid by their employer to do so. At the Velo-City conference last year, one employee spoke about receiving €70 per month. This is because the employees in question get so much per kilometre cycled if they forgo their cars. I would love to see us be a little bit more dramatic on this. I made this point to colleagues and I am disappointed not to see it in the programme for Government but we will keep plugging at it.

I am working on a Bill and the researchers in the House have been very good and I pay tribute to them. The Bill is on the disposal of waste packaging. I will chat to the Minister before I am ready to bring it to the House and I hope he will support it. Some stakeholders will not be too pleased about it because it would involve a degree of change but it would engender a chain reaction of behavioural change that could only be good for the environment and climate action.

See this speech in context