Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

On several occasions in previous debates, I flagged that amendments would be introduced on Report Stage. I am conscious that the Bill has been going through both House for two years. The whole idea of having the two strategies aligned is because we are trying to bring in forward-thinking plans for the next 25 years. It is not the marine plan. It will allow for the legislation. We will have many debates over the next two and half years formalising the MSP. Senators will not be voting on any plan but just on the process.

We had a lengthy discussion around the same process for the national planning framework. Part of the discussion we had in the Seanad was a bit awkward because the legislation came too late and the plan had been adopted. This Bill will put the process for the MSP firmly in legislation. That started last November and will go on for another two years. It is important we have a debate on how we will formulate that plan.

The process itself will be focused on consultation. We touched on this during the previous debate on Senator Grace O'Sullivan’s motion. She made the point that very few people turned up to some of the public consultation events. We want more people at them. There will be different stages of consultation as we go through the process. This is putting consultation on a legislative footing as well as the role and involvement of both Houses in finalising the plan by 2019.