Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I regret that the Minister is not accepting amendment No. 4. I know there are other things that will be done and I will come back to them later, but I want to first return to the question of injustice in the context of this amending legislation on climate action. Recognition of the injustice is core in terms of the action that we need to take. We need to understand, recognise and make as visible as possible our recognition of the injustice. It is sometimes hard to put together the terrible stories we see every week from different parts of the world on the impact of climate change and to place all of those alongside each other and see them as not just a series of individual tragedies but a manifestation of injustice.

In thinking about this issue earlier this morning I came up with the following two metaphors to explain it. We are in a building and we are up on the top floor running all of the water taps. The bottom two floors are already under water, but we are busily discussing which taps we may or may not turn off, our long-term plan for tap turn-off and whether or not the taps we have not turned on should be counted against the taps we might need to turn off. Are we happy to let the water keep rising and people keep dying, not in the future, but this year and next year while we move our figures around in terms of accountancy? It is important that as we do that work of figuring out how we turn off, turn down or escalate the tap on emissions we always remain mindful of those people who are drowning in the lower floors. It is important to also remember that we cannot leave the building. There is only one planet. That is just one metaphor.

Another metaphor for the injustice would be if there was a global pandemic and we had a vaccine recipe that could save the world and 100 countries, including nine of our partner countries which are the least developed countries that Ireland is meant to be supporting, asked for the recipe to be shared in order that they could make more vaccines and save more people sooner. However, we said "No" because the profit of a few companies based near to us is more important than escalating saving everybody from the pandemic. Of course, that is not a metaphor; it is what we are doing now. It is what Ireland will be doing on climate action unless we change our position and support a TRIPS waiver before 27 July.