Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

We are heading the wrong direction but we are turning this ship and State around. I am absolutely convinced that we can do it. We will be good at it. It is challenging. The statistics I read this morning indicate that our economy has expected growth of 8% this year. That is not an excuse but a reality. We have a massive increase in population. Our targets are not set on a per capitabasis, they are fixed quantum so when an additional 70,000 people come into the country, and in fact there are far more if we include migrant workers and others coming, as well as natural population increase, it presents huge challenges. I believe we can do it. There were significant increases last year due largely to transport and agriculture. Transport is coming back because of post-Covid-19 activity and agriculture because of growth in the dairy herd primarily. To be honest it is uncertain. I look forward to the final figure from SEAI. There are slightly different statistics. The Central Statistics Office, CSO, came out the other day with an assessment of a reduction in transport overall use. We will review those SEAI figures. This work has advanced and developed the modelling capability in the State. We are working collectively on that. We can and will meet the targets and the budgets. More than anything else it requires political commitment. There is no shortage of it on this side. However, much of what feeds into this is in local government and in future Governments to make sure we deliver on what has been set out.

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