Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

We have quite a way to go so I will not spend too long in my response. I am surprised at the Minister of State's response to amendment No. 56, given how much focus we have had on agriculture. A good quarter of the debate the last time was on agriculture and on the somewhat rushed decision in respect of how removals have been included. A lot more clarity and nuance were needed before that was inserted. When we talk about clarity and nuance, that is something that should have been done much more clearly and we should have had a lot more debate on it. We should have debated whether we are taking, for example, the UK approach or the EU approach. The UK and the EU have quite different approaches to how removals are addressed within climate accounting.

The amendments were not on public consultation but just transition. We have had lengthy debate on just transition so I will not go over that but those amendments contain explicit legal language that was taken from the Scottish climate law, which holds that part of justice is dialogue. That is a key principle in that law.

The wording "as far as is practicable" was not addressed but we have had debates on that before. It is important that we examine what kind of employment matters and that is an important factor. If there is no sense of what "quality employment" might be in the Government, that would need to be clarified. Hopefully we will get a chance to engage with the Government on that in the committee but as Ireland prepares to send its just transition application to Europe, we would want to be clear about what we mean by "quality employment" at that point, which is not far away.I will move to the other amendments. On the IPCC science, it was not saying the Government must be consistent, it was saying that when it is "[having] regard to [...] scientific or technical advice" that such advice should include advice from the IPCC. If the Minister of State has a different or better wording for that I urge him to bring it back on Report Stage. The Bill will be returning to the Dáil anyway as amendment No. 1 was accepted, so why not fix it if the Minister of State has a good idea? He should bring it forward.

On the UN sustainable development goals, SDGs, I must again strongly and clearly disagree. It is not enough to reference the UNFCCC and the Paris Agreement. The Minister of State has just told us it is not legally binding. That tells us it may or may not happen. It is precisely because it is not legally binding that we must show we have a commitment to it and that we mean anything by it. With due respect to the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, his is the Department responsible for leading on the sustainable development goals and unfortunately he has given very little leadership in this area. I acknowledge colleagues in the Minister of State's own party who are part of the cross-party group, which has representatives from all parties in the Oireachtas, on the sustainable development goals. It is something that matters to us and we need to show it.

It is not a matter of saying one cannot put in everything. Let us be clear about what the Government has put in. It has included having regard to "the attractiveness of the State for investment", "in so far as practicable". We will come to this in section 20 but is all investment equally welcome? Do we want to attract every kind of investment or do we have discretion over what kinds of investment we want to invite? In section 20 we may actually need to place limitations on the liability we have to investors. Sustainable development is referenced in section 4(8)(b). If the Government is going to reference sustainable development and a little bit later it is going to talk about the attractiveness of the State to investors and competitiveness, I ask what sustainable development does it mean if we cannot reference the SDGs? Is there another parallel version of sustainable development that means sustaining business as usual? That could be the case, that could be what is meant. The Minister of State talked about not being clear, that there is no definition of some of the other phrases I have suggested. There is no definition of "sustainable development" in this Bill and it could mean absolutely anything. It could mean something quite different to Shell or Exxon than it does to a small business in Ireland or to the communities mentioned, for example, under Sustainable Development Goal 11: "sustainable cities and communities".

I urge the Minister of State to reflect on that matter. I will be pressing amendments on the sustainable development goals on Report Stage. I will be putting forward a number of approaches to it. I urge the Government to bring its own approach to ensuring the sustainable development goals are referenced and are acknowledged in this legislation. We must show we care about them. I mentioned the definitions but one place the goals are particularly important is with respect to the development of the sectoral strategies. The Government should want to have sectoral strategies in each of the areas that are addressing their climate goals such that they are addressing them in a way that is also fulfilling the SDGs because those are so closely aligned. The section I was inserting this into had the wording "shall have regard to", as opposed to must be consistent with. It is in one version of my amendment but I have amendments where I use the wording "may have regard to" and "shall have regard to". It would be a very poor signal were this Government to say that as it develops these strategies over the next ten years, it should not have regard to the sustainable development goals. I urge the Minister of State to rethink that between now and Report Stage.