Jennifer Whitmore (Wicklow, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

In 2018 the Tánaiste told the European Parliament that Ireland was a climate laggard and promised to do much more to protect the environment. Four years later, the European Commission is not very impressed with the Government's progress. A director in the European Commission's Directorate-General for Environment, Aurel Ciobanu-Dordea, recently gave a speech in which he did not just give the Government both barrels, he actually rolled up in a tank and launched a volley of heavy fire in its direction. I do not have time to list all the egregious breaches of environmental laws and standards that he cited among his laundry list of complaints, but I will just give a flavour. He noted that 50% of Ireland's urban waste water is still not treated in compliance with the urban waste water treatment directive. In case there is any doubt about how shameful this is, it should be noted that said directive dates from 1991. Leakage rates are one of the highest in Europe, currently at an enormous 40%. The water framework directive has still not been fully implemented. The deadline for that was 2003. Meanwhile, almost half of Ireland's rivers have unsatisfactory water quality due to high nitrate levels, which have increased by 26% since 2014.

On our biodiversity crisis, Mr. Ciobanu-Dordea highlighted that many of our bird species are in serious decline, with 54 now on a red list and facing extinction. Further, just 2.5% of our marine waters are designated marine protected areas. The EU target to which we have agreed in this regard is 30%.

On failures of governance, Mr. Ciobanu-Dordea said he was particularly concerned with the punitive cost to the public of access to justice, with anyone wishing to take an environmental case forced into the most expensive legal arena in Europe, which is the Irish High Court. Also of deep concern to the Commission is the recent trend among developers to issue strategic lawsuit against public participation, SLAPP, suits. These are being launched against environmental campaigners. This manifests as wealthy developers threatening individual members of community groups with financial ruin by suing them in the High Court for defamation if they dare to challenge planning decisions. The Government's answer to that charge, if the Tánaiste's colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy Peter Burke, is to be believed, is to make it even harder and more expensive for campaigners to take these cases.

How are we expected to take the Tánaiste's commitments on the environment seriously given this shameful record? Could he confirm his intention to further butcher our planning laws and make it even harder and more expensive to take cases to protect the environment? When will the Government publish the review of our defamation law, which for months has been sitting on the desk of the Minister for Justice?

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