Lynn Boylan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I speak in support of amendments relating to climate justice and just transition because it is important those two principles go through the heart of any of our legislation, now that we are taking an economy-wide approach to climate action. Later on, we hope we will be able to bring amendments on Report Stage around that idea of the right to repair because it is an important element of just transition. It mitigates against planned obsolescence because those who have less means are not always able to constantly buy stuff and it is up to us as legislators to ensure manufacturers are not building obsolescence into their products to force people to buy new products. It is likewise with the right to repair. You should be able to repair products as a fundamental right and we need to remove the barriers on that.

We also have amendments around civic amenity because not only is it relevant to the earlier discussion on littering, it also relates to the just transition as there are people across this State who do not have the same access to civic amenity sites. The hours are different and in some cases the tariffs are substantially different. For example, in one part of the country, you must pay to recycle a Christmas tree and in others it is completely free. We need to have that just transition principle of equality for everybody to be able to access the services when they want to do the right thing on waste management.

It is similar around the issue of food loss and waste. We have concerns with the Bill. We have amendments, which we will withdraw today and reintroduce on Report Stage, around the definitions of food loss and food waste. The Food Loss & Waste Protocol is a multi-stakeholder partnership, which has developed the global food loss and waste accounting and reporting standard. Its steering committee is made up of the Food and Agriculture Organization, FAO, the United Nations Environment Programme, UNEP, and the World Resources Institute, among others. One of the things we seek to do is ensure there is a proper hierarchy around food waste in order that human food donation is prioritised over using human food for animal feed, for example, or reprocessing into non-food products. If there is food that is suitable for human consumption then its use for that should be prioritised. Again, looking at our European counterparts, there are bans in other European countries on the disposal of food fit for human consumption and supermarkets are not allowed do that. As I said, if we do not get to those amendments we will reintroduce them on Report Stage because they are key issues. It is also about the definition of food loss rather than food waste. I would like the Minister of State to address whether or not he will consider that element.