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

I wish the Minister of State every good luck and success. I compliment the Tánaiste on his recent trip abroad to our peacekeeping force in Lebanon and I acknowledge the sad events surrounding the death of Private Rooney. I think of his family and of all the peacekeepers. The reason I mentioned the Tánaiste's trip is that a constituent of mine who has a family relative out there was glad to see the Tánaiste over there meeting our troops and thanking them on behalf of all of us for the excellent work they do. They put themselves in harm's way for the good of everybody else.

I want to use the short bit of time I have to talk about energy security. We have seen what the Ukraine war has done in the massive increase in the cost of fuel and gas and what that means to us here with our energy prices. I want to highlight an anomaly in the Government's failed policies. For example, I mention the shutting down of Bord na Móna and what that has resulted in, and I am glad to bring the following matter to the floor of the Dáil. A ship came into Foynes over the weekend with biomass fuel which needs to be transported up to Offaly. It would not need to be transported there at all if we were cutting turf but now this bio fuel will need 1,750 articulated lorries to shift it out of the ship and up to Offaly. I hope they will redden the road from Foynes up there and I will tell the Minister of State why. I hope they will put black smoke out of their lorries too and I will tell the Minister of State why. They would not have to do it at all if the Minister of State and his Government had left us alone in the first instance and did not take the disgraceful action of shutting down Bord na Móna. That is the result and that is what the Minister of State, Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the Greens have done. Some 1,750 lorries are going up the road thanks to them.

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