Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Acting Chair. I note her personal interest in the topic. It is great that we are having a debate in Seanad Éireann, as well as last night in Dáil Éireann, on the issue of Science Week. We may use this debate as a catalyst or launch point to have a conversation about science in general, research in science, policymaking, and the work that we do as well. I thank Senators for scheduling this debate. I will sharing with my colleague, the Minister of State, Deputy Niall Collins, who will be here for some of it.

I want to start by acknowledging the people who make scientific discovery and who use that progress to benefit all of us. I want to acknowledge on the floor of this House the talent, dedication, sheer dogged determination, hard work and creativity of scientists right across our country. Whether these people are learning maths in school right now, are studying a science, technology, engineering and mathematics, STEM, course at third level or are researching or working in education or in industry, I thank them for their work and for everything they do for our society and economy.

We have thanked many people for the national effort related to Covid-19. I want this House to know, as I am sure it already does, there are so many people behind the scenes whose names we do not know. They are not household names. However, many of us have met them in the course of our work. They are working in university laboratories, in science and research in the broadest sense of the word. They have contributed so much. There is not a university lab in this country that has not helped with the national effort. They have lent personal protective equipment, PPE, they have adapted what they do to help frontline workers and they have undertaken research projects. I came across one of these research projects in University College Dublin, UCD, recently. They are studying the impact of Covid-19 on children, as well as the lasting impact on how we as policymakers might respond to that. I, as Minister for Further and Higher Education, Research, Innovation and Science, want to thank particularly the higher education sector for the contributions they have made.

It is important that we are highlighting the importance of science with Science Week during the very week in which negotiations will hopefully come to a conclusion at the COP26 conference. We are doing so in the context of the pervasive impact that the Covid-19 pandemic is having on our minds. In some of our darkest days, science was our only hope. It has not let us down. As a result, one of the positives to come out of Covid-19 is that it has now brought science in from the shadows. I can see this in a few ways. There is an increase in the number of school leavers applying for STEM courses in this year's leaving certificate. Some scientists have become household names. I see this with my own Creating our Future project, which I will mention. Scientific terms are now part of everyday conversation. Science is being talked about on couches in sitting rooms around the country and around kitchen tables as a result, particularly, of climate change and Covid-19.

We see around climate debates and discourse the incredible engagement of people of all generations, particularly of younger generations, in the science of climate. It is fair to say the outcome of COP26 in Glasgow will shape the future of our planet in a real way. There are huge challenges ahead of us in Ireland and globally. The race is now on to save our planet. We have never before seen the level of engagement and understanding across public conversations about scientific facts and climate and the practical human responses necessary in how we live our everyday lives.

Science and research are at the core of the formidable tasks of understanding and addressing climate change. In this House, during Science Week, it is worth reminding ourselves of the Taoiseach’s words to our leaders in Glasgow last week that Ireland is now ready to play its part. Specifically, at COP26, Ireland has pledged to contribute to the global target of cutting methane. We vowed to more than double Ireland’s contributions to help developing countries by delivering at least €225 million a year by 2025 to help them fight the climate crisis.

On Monday, I was particularly pleased to be in Cork to meet students and staff at University College Cork, UCC. We are proud of UCC. It is the only university in Ireland that has a delegation of researchers and students at COP26. It has official observer status at the conference. The delegation is led by the director of the Science Foundation Ireland funded MaREI Centre for Energy, Climate and Marine at UCC, Professor Brian Ó Gallachóir. I want to acknowledge and commend Professor Ó Gallachóir and all his team for their leadership. I am looking forward to meeting with them on their return. The UCC delegation led by example by making its way to Glasgow in a low-carbon manner by boat and by train. We have all seen through the media coverage that the delegation has been actively contributing to events there. Like my colleagues across Government, my Department is now prioritising our commitments under the climate action plan, including climate solutions through science. I will be happy to keep the House updated on this.

We do a good job in the science sector of talking to each other about science and research. Yet, if we were to be self-critical, we do not do a good enough job of talking to civic society and broader society and of having civic and meaningful engagement about what is science, what is research, why it matters, how it matters to civic society communities and how civic society can get involved.

One of the first measures I put in place on taking up this role as Minister was an initiative called Creating our Future. I did not come up with this idea; it is cogged from an initiative held in the Netherlands. Other countries across the European Union have done it as well. It looks for a democratic mandate in relation to research and science. They go into communities, such as to fisherman in Killybegs, or a school for children with intellectual disabilities, both of whom they have met. They meet with everybody and anybody across society. They ask them what research and science means to them and what they want their publicly funded research in science to be working on. We think it is the right time to have this conversation, because the people of Ireland now have that heightened sense of awareness of and engagement with science. We have invited the public to be central to these conversations. In so doing, we can ensure that the direction of research in Ireland is informed by the people that it serves.

The starting point for all research, science and innovation is simple. It starts with a wonderful idea or an interesting question. I was reminded in the Dáil last night that sometimes small children say the word “why” on loop. That is, I suppose, the beginning of curiosity for science in a young child. We are overwhelmed already by the response to Creating our Future. I thank Members from across the House for their involvement in Creating our Future when it has visited their constituencies and their counties. That will continue until the end of this month. More than 5,000 ideas and questions have been submitted by members of the public. They can submit a question by going to creatingourfuture.ie or watching out for the Creating our Future roadshow coming to their own town. I think Sligo has the most ideas in so far-----