Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I was responding to the Minister of State's responses on these matters. It is also important that I note the concerns raised by Senators on the Government side that were overlapping. The responses of the Minister of State, Deputy Dillon, were not adequate in respect of the question of how the Aarhus Convention requirement of a significant impact on the environment would be assessed. We did not really get an answer about the inappropriate use of a proxy for deciding if there is a significant environmental impact by way of an EIA or AA. There are cases where even they may not be required because appropriate assessment, for example, is extraordinarily narrow and only deals with special areas of conservation and other such Natura sites but where, nonetheless, there is a significant environmental impact. There is a real concern in respect of a number of areas.

Again, I noticed that relates to my amendment No. 27, which seeks to suggest that it is very important that we do not have an exemption where there is a risk that there may be a significant impact on the environment. There is no assessment mechanism within the Bill or within the planning process to say how to assess whether it has a significant environmental impact. It is not adequate to have the proxy of simply the requirement for an EIA or an AA. The Aarhus committee was very clear about that on the issue of retention of permission. That is exactly why Ireland fell short. It was using the wrong tool to decide whether there was a significant environmental impact.

I will not come back to each of the Minister of State's responses because I am conscious of moving to the next section but it is very important to note those concerns because we have heard similar concerns from members on the Government side.They spoke about their concern that the public participation language the Government is bringing in relation to electricity pylons and infrastructure is weak and vague. The legislation simply suggests that there will be regulations around public participation but it is not clear what form that public participation will take. It is not clear whether there will be appropriate tests around environmental impact. Again, I had asked that there would not be any automatic granting where an environmental impact assessment or appropriate assessment was involved. When there is a risk of a significant environmental impact, there should not be any automated granting of planning permission.

I come now to an extremely important point. I refer to those same concerns we have heard about. I have been in the Seanad now for almost ten years and I have heard people talking about inappropriate developments, issues that have arisen, local concerns and the importance of local voices. We heard this again in relation to those who have expressed specific concerns in relation to, for example, questions regarding electricity infrastructure. These are not issues that I have campaigned or been active on, but I know they are ones that were being spoken about by members on the Government side. We cannot have a kind of deniability where we are talking about people's voices and the importance of the public being heard in relation to one specific thing, namely, electricity infrastructure, while ignoring the fact that the Bill railroads over public participation and the public say in loads of other areas.

The example was given that people do not like to see a 70 ft pylon or whatever suddenly appearing in front of their doors. They are also not going to love seeing a mysterious development concerning which they are not even allowed to inquire as to whether it is an exempted development because they cannot get the declaration due to the limitations in place as regards who can get the information on how a development was allowed to be built. If people do not like electricity pylons, they are really not going to love when liquefied natural gas, LNG, infrastructure appears in their areas. This is one of the filthiest and most dangerous forms of fossil fuel infrastructure, not solely for the environment, given that it involves, promotes and supports fracking, something this Government is theoretically against, as was the previous Government, but also because it destroys the local environment for communities. People are going to be blindsided when their local authority will not even have an opportunity to question liquefied natural gas infrastructure under this Bill because it explicitly excludes, in section 82 on strategic gas infrastructure and in the second Schedule, developments consisting of "a terminal, building or installation ancillary to a terminal that is used for the liquefaction of natural gas or the importation, offloading and re-gasification of liquefied natural gas, and ancillary services".

We can think about what those processes - the regasification and liquefaction of gas - look like. This is something that the Government has been telling us again and again, in theory, not to worry about. We had an energy review that stated LNG was not the solution, yet this Bill is going to insert it in as strategic, priority infrastructure that will go straight to An Bord Pleanála, or an coimisiún pleanála in its new name, and not even get examined by local authorities. The public's right to have a say and an input will be curtailed. This is what is being proposed under the legislation.

I suggest, and I mean this with absolute respect, to those expressing concerns about the need to ensure we have proper oversight in relation to electricity infrastructure that this is nothing compared with what we will see if we leave an absolute hostage to fortune in this Bill the mainlining of liquefied natural gas. The debate has always been about whether we should ban LNG. I believe we should and I have amendments that suggest we do so. Let us be clear, however. We are not simply adopting a neutral position. This legislation is prioritising and fast-tracking it. This is why people are right to express concerns about the short-circuiting of public participation.

It also gives a little bit of a lie to some of the language we are hearing about this idea. It is almost a narrative that feels like it is election-ready and that the Government will go out and say the reason it did not solve the housing crisis was planning and the reason it did not deliver on its climate targets was planning. This is the Government's planning Bill and it is seeking to take a massive backwards step in terms of climate action. This is the kind of proposal being presented to us and we need to be really clear about this point. We will have a chance to debate that section more fully when we come to it, but in the context of the debate we are having about other energy infrastructure, it is important to be clear about that. I would certainly prefer to see renewable electricity infrastructure going in rather than filthy LNG fossil-fuel infrastructure that destroys the planet and damages communities.