Mr. Barry Andrews:

Referring to an issue which arose earlier and touching on what Senator Fitzpatrick said, I have made a proposal on having a Dublin office in Brussels. I realise this only impacts those who represent Dublin areas but we represent Dublin and almost every large city of the EU has its own trade and representative office in Brussels. Dublin does not, yet we have four local authorities which do not speak to each other properly and do not align on the key issues of transport and housing about which all of us have been talking about today. I would like to get support from everybody to push this issue, to have a place within Brussels where we can X-ray and find out what proposals are going to impact us, as a city and county, in the future and what legislation is coming, whether directives or regulations.

On the question of the energy crisis, there are some things the EU can do contrary to the Government opposing ideas that came from other Council member states, for example, a strategic gas reserve is something the EU should and will support in my opinion. However, I am not able to comment on whether suspending the current wholesale electricity market in the way that is proposed would be beneficial or not. My main concern is energy poverty which impacts so many families throughout Dublin. With a sixfold increase in energy prices, this is very dangerous.

Finally, on the SDGs, I am glad they were thought of because that space has been almost completely cannibalised by climate policy. There are so many other SDGs touching on the things Senator Sherlock talked about, so we need to put that at the centre of debate, particularly as we consider how we recover from the pandemic.