Luke Flanagan (Roscommon-South Leitrim, Independent)
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Question 34: To ask the Minister for the Environment; Community and Local Government if he will be using Mechanical Biological Treatment or Incineration to deal with the country's residual waste. [11793/11]

Phil Hogan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael)
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The programme for Government commits to the development of a coherent national waste policy, adhering to the waste hierarchy, which will aim to minimise waste disposal in landfill and maximise recovery. I am prioritising this commitment, as I am anxious to provide early regulatory certainty, in the form of policy and legislation, to ensure that the necessary actions and investments are progressed to achieve those aims.

During the Dáil Second Stage debate on the Environment (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill on 14 April 2011, I outlined the guiding principles which will inform the waste policy development process. These principles will serve to ensure that future waste policy will: be designed to minimise the volumes of waste generated and to extract the maximum value from those wastes which arise; be founded on a firm, evidence-based understanding of the many scientific, economic and social issues which are inherent elements of the waste policy discourse; and be designed to facilitate necessary investment in infrastructure, within an appropriately regulated waste market framework.

Our current over-reliance on landfill facilities is unsustainable and the move away from landfill must be accelerated. We must ensure that a range of infrastructure is available to treat the waste we generate in an environmentally appropriate manner. That process of infrastructural diversification must be guided not by a fixation in favour of or against any particular process or technology, but by a policy approach, consistent with the waste hierarchy, which creates the space within which the range of appropriate infrastructure that we need can be brought forward.

I look forward to engaging with parliamentary colleagues and the range of interests in the waste sector in the development of this policy framework. I intend that this work will be completed by the end of this year.

Luke Flanagan (Roscommon-South Leitrim, Independent)
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I thank the Minister. I still have not established whether he plans on going down the route of mechanical biological treatment or incineration. When I was a local authority member, the regional waste management plans were discussed at the county council. At the time the Minister was in opposition and there was considerable talk about how Fine Gael was planning on having a zero waste strategy. It was not naïve - believing we would have zero waste - but was a goal to strive for.

Michael McCarthy (Cork South West, Labour)
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The Deputy should ask a supplementary question.

Luke Flanagan (Roscommon-South Leitrim, Independent)
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Has Fine Gael moved away from that policy and will it now follow the last Government's policy? Will we definitely go down the route of burning resources or will we go down the route of maximising the uses to which we can put these resources, bearing in mind the embodied energy used in creating these products that the Minister seems intent on burning?

Phil Hogan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael)
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I am sure the Deputy would not expect me to make a policy statement on waste management today when I have already stated I will consult parliamentary Members and agree a waste policy at the end of the year. If he is asking me to make a decision now, I will, but I would like to consult people about it. The Deputy was a member of a local authority which, in conjunction with others, had to draw up a regional waste management strategy. It was up to local authority members and members of regional authorities to help in drawing up such a strategy by way of a devolved function. Unfortunately, at the time councillors abdicated responsibility on the direction they wanted to take in devising a waste strategy and ultimately the then Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government was forced to abandon the process of consultation and take responsibility for decision making from local authority members and give managers in counties and regions the necessary powers to make decisions without reference to those who had been democratically elected. I do not want to go down that road either. If people want to make decisions about the future of waste policy, to have devolved functions and responsibility restored to them, they must equally be accountable for the decisions they make. I will set out the process by which this can be achieved by the end of the year.

Luke Flanagan (Roscommon-South Leitrim, Independent)
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With respect, it was not the actions of local authority members such as me that led to power being taken away. In fact, when I was a county councillor, we did not have that power. It was weak-minded people such as Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil local authority members who could not deal with the facts; they went with what the crowd was saying at the time.

Michael McCarthy (Cork South West, Labour)
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The Deputy should ask a supplementary question.

Luke Flanagan (Roscommon-South Leitrim, Independent)
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What power did local authority members have, other than the power to talk about the matter in the past six or seven years? The power rested completely with the county manager. Surely, as a democrat, the Minister believes it should rest with elected local authority members who are closest to the problem. Where do local authority members have an input into the process? I never had one as a county councillor; it was an executive function.

Phil Hogan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael)
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The Deputy might not have been a member of Roscommon County Council, but I am sure he has heard that local authority members at the time had the power to draw up regional waste management plans.

Luke Flanagan (Roscommon-South Leitrim, Independent)
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Not in the past six years.

Michael McCarthy (Cork South West, Labour)
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The Minister to continue, without interruption, please.

Phil Hogan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Fine Gael)
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Rome did not start six years ago either. The Deputy started late, but he is making up for lost time. I want to return what is a devolved function to local authority members to deal with waste issues. However, they will do so based on guiding principles for national waste policy which the Deputy will have an opportunity to discuss while he is a Member of this House in the near future.