Dáil debates

Thursday, 16 September 2021

Maritime Area Planning Bill 2021: Second Stage (Resumed)

 

2:00 pm

Photo of Ruairi Ó MurchúRuairi Ó Murchú (Louth, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

We all accept the necessity of dealing with the climate change crisis. We all heard about the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, report over the summer. We are aware of the situation with which we are dealing. We know we need to make the 2030 and 2050 targets and that renewables are a huge part of this. The byword has to be "sustainability". It is about putting a system and a complete framework in place. Deputy Ó Broin spoke yesterday about this being a once in a generation opportunity. That is true whether we are talking about the Maritime Area Planning Bill or the entire framework, including the national marine planning framework. It is about putting all those pieces together. I welcome what Deputy O'Sullivan said about the Minister of State engaging with NGOs and all the stakeholders. That is absolutely necessary. We welcome what the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, said yesterday as regards plenty of time and consideration being given to all these aspects on Committee Stage. That is an absolute requirement.

We know the difficulties we have with power at this time. There were questions earlier in the Chamber about blackouts and the fears around energy and electricity supply. Some of these issues are due to Covid but there are worries from many people, who know better than myself, about the entire infrastructure being capable of dealing with even more of this offshore wind energy when we are finally able to bring it into play. There are questions about whether we have the infrastructure required or whether we are going to be dealing with a huge amount of power dissipation. That is something the Government needs to assess to ensure that is not the case.

We all accept we need to make sure we deal with sustainability and that means biodiversity and engaging and dealing with fishermen. We all accept the necessity of offshore wind but we need to ensure we can maintain what we have, the resources we have and people's livelihoods. Some of these families have fished for multiple generations and it is a requirement we keep the whole show on the road. There is a big onus on the Government in this entire set-up. We must give the marine area regulatory authority sufficient powers and we have to make sure we deal with the planning process at every point in view in order that we can deliver the end result. A huge amount of engagement with all stakeholders and with the Opposition will be necessary because we need to deliver this. This is about the continuity and sustainability of our entire people.

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