Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I too thank Deputy Naughten and his colleagues from the Regional Group for tabling the motion. I support its sentiment, without hesitation. I support the call that MARA be established and operational within 12 months, the upgrading of the ports, the overall message and acknowledgement we must reduce our dependency on fossil fuels and the acknowledgement the current circumstances are developer led. I could not but agree with all that.

I am not nitpicking but I am not sure about the suggestion we should "exploit" our resources. If the biodiversity crisis and the climate crisis have taught us anything, it is that we should get rid of those words of exploitation but rather use our resources. Our maritime area is an absolutely wonderful resource and, as Deputy Naughten and others pointed out, we have one of the largest such areas in Europe, at seven times our land mass. Even so, we cannot go back. We face an existential crisis and we cannot go back. All development in the future must be sustainable and we should use our resources in the most sustainable way for the maximum number of people and for the common good. I do not think Deputy Naughten would have a difficulty with that. I think "exploit" is a word we should get rid of. We talk about this in the context of 2.13% of Ireland's marine area having been designated as protected.

We are massively behind on that, which is something I have a significant difficulty with. When we discussed the Maritime Area Planning Bill that is going through the Dáil and Seanad, we were told this was a parallel piece of legislation. I do not accept that. It should have been the first piece of legislation. We know from EirGrid and the windmills on land that they are developer-led as well. As a result, we have no plan and no overall vision even though this is a wonderful opportunity if we do it right to make Ireland green and an example to other countries and to show the way, even though we are a small country, albeit with a huge marine area.

I have a major problem with the community benefit. Deputy Harkin mentioned that. I believe it is a divide-and-conquer approach. The word "unity" is a misnomer. It is even less involvement when it comes to offshore energy - quite understandably because it is quite complicated - that the community could not own. There is a significant possibility for the community to own onshore wind and to bring people on board - to bring the likes of me on board to look at how areas in Galway such as Claddagh, Shantalla and Bohermore can become self-sufficient - but not by means of this divide-and-conquer approach.

I refer to the Convention for the Protection of the Marine Environment of the North-East Atlantic. There was a ministerial meeting and we signed the Cascais Declaration. There are 29 paragraphs in that. If I had more time, I would go through them all. Paragraphs 15 and 16 deal with offshore renewable energy and state:

15. Offshore renewable energy will play a key role in decarbonising our economies in the coming decades but knowledge gaps still exist about its impact on the marine environment. We will take action to promote and facilitate the sustainable expansion of renewable energy developments while respecting our commitments to a healthy and biologically diverse marine environment.

16. Human activities are reaching further into the ocean than ever before, unlocking new opportunities for sustainable use of resources in the OSPAR maritime area. We will lead on assessing the impacts on the marine environment of human activities taking place under our jurisdiction or control in ABNJ, in line with the precautionary principle and to avoid serious harm to the environment.

Unfortunately, the motion does not quite capture that but I note that Deputy Denis Naughten is nodding, and that he has no difficulty with it. I would think that this is the beginning of an urgent conversation in the context of realising that we cannot exploit our oceans any more and recognising that nature is part of us and that we must work hand in hand if we are going to deal with the existential crisis facing us but still have jobs for our people and real and meaningful community involvement, leadership and benefit.

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