Ciarán Ahern (Dublin South West, Labour)

I commend Deputies Pa Daly and Quinlivan on bringing forward this really excellent Bill. The Labour Party is glad to give it our support. We have a long history of advocating for better waste management and advocating for measures to reduce waste. Indeed, it is more than 20 years since we published our Waste Matters policy document in 2005, an alternative strategy on waste management to that of the Government of the day. It proposed radical and meaningful actions to improve the ways we deal with waste and build the appropriate infrastructure to do so. Many of those policy proposals have since been adopted, like waste segregation, investing in recycling plants, providing waste treatment facilities and so on.

Our commitment to waste management and minimisation is rooted in our vision for a red-green future for Ireland, and our belief that the current economic model of endless growth at all costs is incompatible with addressing the climate crisis and creating a more sustainable economy. It is my belief that in order for us to secure our future and the future of our environment, we need to move towards an economic model which is not entirely predicated on continual consumption, but rather based on the principles of a circular economy and even doughnut economics. Obviously this will not happen overnight. It will be about radical but incremental and practical change. Deputies Daly and Quinlivan’s Bill, in the idea behind it and what it seeks to achieve, deals with two really important aspects of that move towards a more circular economy and addressing the climate crisis more broadly, namely, transparency and sustainability.

Tackling waste and addressing our tendency to discard and replace products at the first sign of a defect is probably the key element in bringing about that circular economy. The reality is that much of the waste that we produce need not be waste at all. Too often, viable goods or products are tossed, and replacement is prioritised over repair. The offshoot is that so many products needlessly end up in landfills or incinerators. I do not need to spell out the damage that does to our environment. It is unsurprising in many ways because little is ever done to actually encourage people to make an effort to repair a product in the first instance, nor has there been much of an incentive to do so. I do think there is a lack of transparency on repairability of products and that certainly feeds into that tendency to get rid of them at the first sign of trouble.

As I have said, this Bill provides a way of addressing that lack of transparency in a simple and practical way. The absence of much encouragement or the lack of information around the repairability of electrical products, among others, has led to a sort of culture of discarding, which simply is not compatible with a circular economy. This Bill provides redress for both of those elements, namely, encouragement and actual information. If people knew what was repairable, what parts might be needed and how they would go about it, they would be more inclined to do so.

This Bill also provides a good way of giving effect to some elements of a directive that was passed by the European Parliament last year on the so-called right to repair, something which my party has called for in the past. In 2022, the Labour Party put down an amendment to the Consumer Rights Bill that would have effectively introduced such a right on all electronics sold within the State. The amendment was rejected by the Government at the time, largely on the basis that the EU proposal was still pending. However, as it has now been adopted by the Parliament and Council, we would like to see the Government move in that regard.

The provisions of this Bill should play a part in transposing the directive. Indeed, one of the key aspects of that directive is that information on repair conditions and services should be provided with products. I acknowledge that in this Bill's provisions apply to certain products like laptops and washing machines but I welcome the Deputies' inclusion of ministerial discretion in applying the provisions to more products. I encourage the Minister to use that discretion liberally. There is scope in that regard to take meaningful action to tackle what is referred to as planned obsolescence - the Minister of State mentioned this earlier - where manufacturers design products with the intention that they would break or become obsolete in the short to medium term. It has been a problem for decades but has become particularly acute in the electronics industry. E-waste is one of the fastest growing waste streams and the proliferation of planned obsolescence is one of the key contributing factors. We see a lot of it with products like cars, laptops and phones. It is particularly frustrating with phones because often it is a software issue. The phone itself might be fine structurally but with iPhones, for example, if your phone is an older model it eventually cannot facilitate software updates and basically stops working.

The practice of planned obsolescence plays into that linear economic model where we discard and replace instead of repairing. It is clearly unsustainable. The amount of raw materials exploited in making electronics and the amount of waste created when they are discarded is extremely damaging to the global environment. I am conscious that given the globalised nature of manufacturing, addressing planned obsolescence and the waste it creates is perhaps best addressed at an EU level and I am glad that work is being carried out in that regard but there are effective measures we can take at a national level. This Bill provides one. I know that Deputies Daly and Quinlivan took inspiration from a French law introduced in 2020 that brought in a scoring system for tech products and appliances where a sticker on packaging indicates an estimated lifespan and the durability and repairability of the product. It is simple but effective. It is something we in the Labour Party have called for to be introduced previously. France has also introduced a law which bans the deliberate curtailment of the lifespan of a product, thereby addressing that issue of planned obsolescence, and has been strong in enforcing it. In 2020, France's consumer protection authority fined Apple €25 million for failing to inform customers that updating their phone’s software would slow the device down.

There are things we can do to address these issues at a national level without necessarily waiting for co-ordinated action at EU level. This Bill and what it introduces is one example. I also ask the Government to consider the Labour Party proposal to establish a national recycling and repair company. Public enterprises have played a critical role in the industrial and economic development of this State and as we reshape our economy to a more sustainable and circular model, they must play a key role again. It could perhaps be developed from within the current Bord na Móna company structure, could provide for the development of a social pillar in the circular economy and could provide for more attractive working conditions, as well as focusing on training and ensuring sufficiently skilled workers to build up economic resilience and job safety in a growing sector.

Before I conclude, I will pay tribute to the various community groups like the men’s and women’s sheds that run repair cafés and provide voluntary repair services in their local areas. Often, they will provide workshops where people can learn how to repair common household items themselves too. A lot of them relate to bicycles and other things like that. We are blessed in Dublin South-West to have many community organisations who put the principles of sustainability and a circular economy into action. I particularly want to commend the new Priory Market that will open in Tallaght on the quantity of re-used materials that are being put into its new facilities. It looks absolutely stunning but is a really great example of the circular economy working. I believe we should be doing more to support these groups. I know that for many, insurance is a big issue. A State scheme for insurance or some form of annual grant funding, which we have called for already, would be a really helpful measure to allow them to grow and flourish and I ask the Minister to consider it. I want to again commend the Deputies on bringing forward this Bill. It is a really positive initiative and I urge the Minister to put it into action.

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