Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, Independents 4 Change) | Oireachtas source

I was to share time with Deputy McNamara, but he does not seem to be in the Chamber at the moment.

Last week, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, published its 2023 report, which has been described as a "final warning" for the survival of humans on the planet. The IPCC now estimates that we will pass the target of 1.5 degrees in years not decades if we do not rapidly change course in our climate action. We know the effects of climate will hit the poorest first and hardest, not just globally but in Ireland too. The Society of St. Vincent de Paul estimates that as much as 40% of Irish people are living in energy poverty, while the fossil fuel companies use increases in fuel costs to maximise their profits. The Government seems to be giving the final say on the windfall tax to the same companies whose profit the tax is supposed to be targeting.

The Government has been implementing regressive taxes and grants to fight climate change. It has introduced the insulation grants that many people cannot access. It brought in carbon taxes that affect the poorest the most. It talks about the sustainability while poverty and homelessness increase. We are supposed to have a Green Party in the Government who fights for climate action. Instead we have a Green Party that swaps making people homeless, and betraying the victims of mother and baby institutions, for missed climate targets and bike lanes. The Government makes it harder to drive while reducing the number of buses and delaying public transport plans. It will not listen to people who have been impacted by the carbon taxes but will listen to corporations about windfall taxes. Now the leader of the Green Party is swapping taxpayers' money for carbon credits to cover up policy failures. How on earth are we supposed to believe anything this Government says when one part of it, which proposes to fight climate change, is spending up to €3 million filling gaps left by its failure to cut emissions?

The Government has no vision. It has no vision on housing or on healthcare and certainly no vision on the climate crisis. We need to take the money and the power off the giant corporations, whose greed caused this crisis, so that we can implement the change needed to stop irreversible damage to this planet. Do your job, Minister, because we are running out of time.

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