Róisín Garvey (Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I want to come back in on something that Senator Ruane mentioned. I meant to raise it when we were discussing hedgerows and trees. With regard to An Bord Pleanála, for the record I want to make sure that it is very clear that we should only be acquiring land in instances where it is needed for BusConnects or active travel. We must ensure that it is not going to increase carbon emissions. Otherwise, we are going against the climate action plan. I want that to be on the record of the House. I will seek to bring an amendment on Report Stage. It is important that we acquire land to progress our modal shift and to reach our huge target of halving the carbon emissions from transport. Cutting trees is one part of it, of course. It is also important that we are only acquiring land to reduce our carbon emissions and not to increase car use. As Sarah McInerney - who has not always seen eye to eye with me - said on RTÉ radio last night, if you build for cars, you get cars. If you build it, they will come. Let us be careful about how we use our acquisition and ensure that we continue to focus on not contributing to carbon emissions.