Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The Minister, Deputy Ryan, has done an Elvis Presley and left the building, which was the wrong thing to do. He should have remained here and listened to what Deputies have to say on this issue. It was he who on one of the few times he left Dublin, went to Kildare to announce the closure of Bord na Móna, one of his proudest moments. It was a shameful moment, one that he, the Minister of State, Deputy Ossian Smyth, and all in the other parties and none who supported that decision will regret for a long time. One of the aims of the programme for Government 2016 was an LNG project for the Shannon Estuary. In the infinite wisdom of Government, we now do not need an LNG project. Of course, we do. I accept that it should not use fracked gas, but there are other ways of having LNG in this country. We need surety of supply for energy. We should not be here today saying we do not want any more data centres here because they are using up our energy; we should be discussing how we can bring about surety of supply. The response from Government is a proposal to increase the number of generators, which are to be operated on diesel or gas. That is a very inefficient way of dealing with the situation. It has also mentioned purchasing energy form the UK and France, which will be nuclear energy. That is not a smart move. We should focus our efforts on surety of supply. It is important to make the point that not only the Government parties, but Sinn Féin, the Labour Party and others are in a race to the bottom regarding the need to protect the climate and the future and not the here and now. I am worried about the elderly people who this winter and next might not have energy in their homes.

This debate is about data centres. I remind the Government that older people require heat and electricity to cook their breakfast and dinner. Many of them have no alternative to electricity because the chimneys in their houses are closed off. The Government parties need to watch what they are doing because it will come back to bite them in the bottoms, as it is doing so already.

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