Ivana Bacik (Independent)

I welcome the Minister of State, Deputy Jan O'Sullivan, to the House and thank her for attending throughout the debate. Her presence has been useful. I am glad to be involved in this debate. I wish to pay tribute to Senator Kelly, who has pioneered the Bill on behalf of the Labour group with a bit of help from some of us. To respond to Senator Norris, the Bill would have benefited from greater consultation with more drafters, but we wanted to put the issue on the Seanad's legislative agenda and, importantly, to ensure that the Bill's principles were accepted at governmental level.

As Senator Kelly stated, the Bill is based largely on legislation tabled before the House of Lords by Lord Reay. The concept is the same and quite straightforward, namely, one should incorporate into general planning a rule about the proximity of wind farms and wind turbines to residential houses.

Our Bill is not against wind energy, a point that other Senators have made. We are in favour of developing renewable and sustainable energy sources. As someone who has been involved with Friends of the Earth Ireland since its founding, I am strongly in favour of developing renewable energy sources, including wind and wave energy. Offshore installations in particular possess significant potential. I am also one of those unusual people who find wind turbines quite beautiful to look at, albeit from a distance.