Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 6:

In page 12, line 16, after “year.” to insert the following:

“Where the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform declines consent for monies from a source other than the Houses of the Oireachtas to enter the Climate Action Fund, a rationale for such a decision should be published and laid before both Houses.”.

I was glad to hear the Minister mention that he has an ambition for the EU recovery fund and the European Investment Bank, EIB, pan-European guarantee, for example, and for other sources of funding and fiscal instruments that are set up on a pan-European basis. The EU recovery fund will, crucially, not simply provide money in loans but in grants. It will be money that will not require a future repayment from the Exchequer and will not necessarily create a future cost for the State. There are also international initiatives being taken by UN agencies, for example, and others that are aimed towards accelerating our action on climate change. Those are moneys that may come from a source other than the Houses of the Oireachtas. They are not moneys we need to gather in revenue from any levy or from a loan the State will have to repay in the future. These are grant moneys and emergency moneys that might be made available for the climate action fund.

I note that in the legislation the Minister is correctly given the power to have that money come in but it states, "with the consent of the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform". I am sure the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform will probably give that consent but my amendment was almost akin to a safeguard because we do not want it to be the case that the Minister for Finance or the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, whose remits more rightly relate to the expenditure of the moneys the State holds already, effectively determine exactly where the money goes. Every Minister has an important and crucial role in how they ensure the delivery of their briefs. The Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment is in the unusual position whereby some of the moneys available to fulfil his brief and his ambition for his Department, may be externally available without cost. If there was a circumstance in which the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform was to decline consent for such money to come into the State or to enter the climate action fund, it would be reasonable that he or she would be asked to provide a rationale for same.

This is really an attempt to strengthen the Minister's hand and to ensure that where he sees an opportunity for funding the climate action fund, which will benefit everyone in the State, he is fully empowered to go after that opportunity. The Minister might be able to give me some other assurances that there will never be any obstacle to him doing that or that he will never be told he should not go after funding because another priority is preferred.