Mr. Billy Kelleher:

Sometimes we ask the EU to do more than it can do and what we allow it to do. That is a big challenge. For example, Senator Gavan referred to migrants and the need for us to have a compassionate way of dealing with people who come through the asylum process or who just present themselves at borders who are fleeing persecution or war-torn areas. The difficulty is that the European Commission and the European Parliament have published very detailed documents on this particular issue, but the Council at member state level is causing difficulties in trying to move the issue forward. That is a very problematic area for us. The parliament has consistently tried to move, along with the Commission, to have a humane, uniform way of dealing with people who either enter through the asylum process or arrive at borders fleeing persecution. Until such time as the Council gets its act together, we are moribund in trying to deal with that particular issue. That is a significant problem. I accept the criticism of it. We are asking the Union to do something that the member states that make it up will not allow it to do.

The European Green Deal, the Common Agricultural Policy, the biodiversity strategy, the farm to fork strategy, energy security, cybersecurity and the digital economy are all buzzwords and phrases, but at the end of the day what they are about in the coming years is that we are trying to define a policy that will shift our dependence on carbon emissions through to carbon neutrality. We have targets for 2030 and 2050 as well. We are bound by national legislation in terms of what Senators have passed in here, but also by our obligations under the Paris Agreement and the policies that were adopted by the European Parliament recently on the reduction in carbon emissions.

In response to Senator Higgins, one of the issues in moving from where we are to where we want to be is that many countries, primarily in eastern Europe, are very dependent on coal and fossil fuels in general for generating electricity. The question is if we can transition from where we are now to carbon neutrality by 2050 without using transition fuels like gas, for example.There was a great debate around taxonomy and what would be included as sustainable or what would be excluded. If certain issues are excluded, it may not be possible to transition, particularly for countries with economies that are significantly dependent on coal. When we mention nuclear energy in this country and in this discussion, alarm bells are raised. We also have to acknowledge that 12 member states either have nuclear energy or are developing it. That is a significant number.

From our perspective in Ireland, one area where we are lethargic and could do a lot is biomethane and anaerobic digestion. We could address some of the agricultural challenges we will have in the coming years and transition the economy by using solar, wind and biomethane energy as a way of fuelling transportation, for home heating, etc. The rest of Europe is far ahead of us in this area, which would have a profound impact on agricultural production. Waste from agriculture, municipal waste and other forms of waste we generate regularly would be used to make the transition. That would be well within our remit if we could accept that it will play a significant role in the years ahead.