Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Troy for this question and for keeping in touch with me on the issue. I am very committed to making sure we deliver an EV centre of excellence at Columb Barracks, Mullingar. As the Deputy will be aware, I visited there previously. As recently as in the past two weeks, the chief executive of SOLAS visited there also and met the local education and training board, ETB, about this project and on a number of other issues.

As the Deputy will be aware, the Government is fully committed to achieving our ambitious targets set out in the climate action plan 2023. A key component of the plan is the importance of fleet electrification and a target has been set for 30% of our private car fleet to be comprised of electric vehicles by 2030. Zero Emission Vehicles Ireland, ZEVI, has been established as the dedicated office charged with supporting consumers, the public sector and businesses to continue to make the switch to zero emission vehicles.

It is important that projected workforce requirements are informed by the expertise of the relevant sectoral, departmental and industry experts, with my Department contributing based upon its responsibility to align future skills needs with current and emerging workforce plans developed by the sector. In this context, my Department is supporting this transition by ensuring that through the further education and training strategies, sustainable green skills are key components of our further education and training processes.

I understand very well that the Longford and Westmeath education and training board, LWETB, has submitted an application to develop the new centre and an electric vehicle maintenance centre of excellence in Columb Barracks. My Department has been advised by SOLAS that a new proposal specifically relating to the electric vehicle maintenance skills centre at Columb Barracks is now being prepared by LWETB. The proposal will be subject to full evaluation by SOLAS. This is something we will see happen. I believe that Mullingar will be home to a centre of excellence for electric vehicle training. It will be a key component to roll out retrofitting. It is one of the big pieces of work we have done in the last number of years and we now have enough centres in that space and EV training will be the next one. Columb Barracks is an ideal site and location. I am fully committed, as are my Department, SOLAS, and the LWETB, to making this happen.

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