I thank Deputy O'Gorman and the Green Party for tabling the motion, which we support. We have also tabled two amendments, which I will mention later. The main point is that history will not treat this Government kindly, if history gets to be written. Maybe that is what it is counting on. One after another, the Government is ripping up its climate commitments relating to LNG, data centres, public transport, nitrates, marine protected areas, MPAs, forestry, you name it. The Fianna Fáil-Fine Gael-Lowry lackey Government is going backwards. It is no coincidence this is happening. Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and whoever is in government with them serve the interests of big business. That is who benefits from the expansion of data centres, extending the nitrates derogation and locking us in to fossil fuel dependence on LNG. Recently, a booklet called Sitka Spruce the Amazing Timber Tree was distributed to Irish schools. It included an endorsement from the then Minister of State with responsibility for forestry, waffling about forests being homes for birds and animals - not if they are Sitka spruce, they are not. These plantations are biodiversity dead zones and should never be promoted as a solution to the climate or biodiversity crisis. Deputy Michael Healy-Rae might have resigned but his cynical pro-business greenwashing attitude lives on. It is shown in the Government's amendment, which ignores the core demand of this motion, that is, for the Government to recommit to reducing carbon emissions by 51% by 2030, a supposedly legally binding commitment. Instead, we get vague waffle about being "fully committed to ... climate ambition". However, the only semi-concrete target mentioned is climate neutrality by 2050. The Government is also trumpeting an €18.9 billion investment in the national grid. What it fails to mention is that this will be swallowed up by data centres, just like they have swallowed up the increase in renewable energy in recent years. The Government has gone all-in on the AI bubble, so all this grid expansion will go to big tech too and it wants workers to pay for it through higher household energy bills. That is what People Before Profit's amendments are about. We say ordinary people should not have to pay for a climate crisis caused by capitalism. It is why we have always opposed the carbon tax - not just increases to it, but the entire tax. It is time to make big polluters pay. The Green Party motion notes the rapid growth in data centres in Ireland will lead to increased household energy prices. It leaves out that it has done that already, including under the previous Green Party coalition, and it does nothing to fix it. Our amendments are about banning the building of any more data centres, taxing existing data centres to fund a €500 energy credit for households and making sure data centres pay the same price for electricity as households and not half price as they do currently. Our amendments also call for making public transport free and the expansion of bus and rail services. It makes no sense that during a fuel crisis, the Government is cutting taxes on petrol and diesel, which we welcome, but doing nothing to incentivise people to use public transport. Fares are being abolished in Australia in response to the current energy crisis. The same needs to happen here.

Sentiment score: 0.10