John McGahon (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I ask the Leader to invite the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment to the Seanad for a debate on air pollution and air quality on the island of Ireland. At this point in time, four people are dying in Ireland a day as a direct result of complications from poor air quality and one in five children suffers from asthma because of it. The roll-out of a nationwide ban on smoky solid fuel would significantly help reduce air pollution on this island. Detailed research has shown that air pollution levels are significantly higher in towns on this island that do not have a smoky coal ban. The programme for Government has promised legislation which would add a further ten towns to the list by the end of this year. It states that the Government will work towards "a full nationwide ban" on smoky coal. I have just come from the Joint Committee on Climate Action, where we were talking about debating the climate Bill next week. We need to be much more ambitious than working towards the ban and introducing it town by town. We need to impose it nationwide.Consider the statistics on why we need to do that. A report from the Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, on air quality in 2018, which was published last September, estimated that poor air quality caused up to 1,180 premature deaths per annum and found a strong correlation between poor air quality, as recorded by the EPA, and increased daily hospital admissions for cases of asthma-related illnesses and heart failure.

We know that the current ban is unenforceable. Indeed, it is virtually unenforceable where local authorities' litter wardens have to patrol in this regard. We must be ambitious. I would appreciate it if we could invite the Minister to attend to discuss two matters - air pollution on the island of Ireland and his plans to introduce a nationwide ban on smoky solid fuels within the lifetime of the Government.