Lynn Boylan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I would like to raise the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, IPCC, report, which is a stark reminder of the failure of successive Governments to heed the call of scientists to act on climate change. I will focus on a few points of the report, one being adaptation. The IPCC report is crystal clear about the global failures to adopt to climate change. Again, those least responsible for the climate crisis will be those least able to adapt. The Climate Change Advisory Council examined the Government's performance on adaptation, and the scorecard is damning. Not a single sector was given the highest score.

The IPCC report is a stark reminder, not only of the dire impact of climate change on biodiversity but also the potentially negative impact of our efforts to solve climate change. In Ireland, we have had too many examples of what the panel yesterday referred to as "maladaptive actions". Examples of this happening in Ireland would include Amazon's wind farm that is leading to bog slides, and Bord the Móna's attempt to build on the site of the mid-Shannon wilderness park, despite the fact that this was a carbon sink. I have repeated over and again in this Chamber that we cannot allow biodiversity to be the sacrificial lamb of climate action.

I will also raise the issue of climate justice. As a wealthy country, Ireland has a key role to play in ensuring the additional funds for climate finance for the poorest regions so that they were able to adapt. It is very clear again that while the poorest have contributed the least globally, the same is true on the national scale where the top 10% of Ireland's earners emit nearly as much as the bottom 50%.

These are just some of the points that came up in the report yesterday. Back in December 2020, we talked about having climate crisis as a standing issue on the Order of Business. I ask the Leader if we could again look at that to have an update on what is happening about that.