I have been listening to the debate and it has been astonishing to hear the variety of opinions, concerns and misapprehensions about this Bill. On the one hand, I think it does represent progress. I remember when the Planning and Development (Strategic Infrastructure) Act was passed in 2006 and how that was a step forward in terms of bringing those strategic infrastructure projects into An Bord Pleanála, as it then was, rather than having them always going through local authorities and being delayed that way. In many ways, the 2006 Act was a step forward, but it did not really work, because we have found ourselves in a situation where we are still being delayed with those important strategic applications being made. On the one hand, I recognise the potential progress that comes from this Bill and its necessity in terms of moving these critical infrastructure projects along. On the other hand, I have listened to what people have said about their concerns regarding what the impact of this legislation might be, specifically the modification of the way section 15 of the climate action Act will operate. Some Members have, essentially, catastrophised about the notion that suddenly we will be throwing out the door any concerns about climate action or taking cognisance of the fact that this is an existential threat for us, not just in this country but throughout the world. If I thought that was the case, I must say I would have a real problem with this legislation. I think, however, that two things hold for me. First, and most importantly, European law is still supreme to this legislation. This means the safeguards people are concerned about are still there at a European level, and challenges will still be possible in that context. The second thing is that there was a suggestion that I think is grounded in the notion that we cannot trust the Government to do the right thing. I fundamentally reject that. I know this is a week in which many people in this Chamber are suggesting that, but there is not actually a basis for that view. There is not any evidence to back it up. In my lifetime as an adult, if I can put it that way, the Government has consistently acted responsibly. I know we had a crash 15 years ago and there was irresponsibility that led to that, and that is fine, but in terms of corruption, all the indicators internationally are that this is a country in which we have gone away from corruption. We have moved away from the corruption we saw in the 1990s, which resulted - regressively, I think - in the removal of all these powers from local authority members. That is for another day’s debate. I do not think there is any basis now on which people should be suspicious about the operation of policy by the Government, which is elected by the people. There was talk about a lack of transparency. I note, for example, that section 3(4) requires that any orders made under section 3 would be laid before the Dáil within a reasonable period of time. There is, therefore, transparency there. People will know what orders have been made, what the basis of those orders is for and what the impact of those orders would be. I kind of feel that any of those concerns that have been outlined are assuaged by what is actually in the Bill. I think the safeguards that are there mean we do not need to catastrophise about this legislation. It does not represent some kind of catastrophic or disastrous relinquishment of the important laws in relation to climate change and the safeguards that exist for climate change. I have heard other colleagues complaining about snails, frogs, bats, mosses and all that kind of thing. Those are important things, and we should not downplay the importance of biodiversity and the protection of that biodiversity. When I look at this legislation, I also think about the strategic progress that needs to be made in terms of what we actually deliver for people in this country. At the moment, we have a situation where the types of projects that I anticipate will be covered by this legislation are, on average, taking 63 weeks to get to first-stage approval. This is before any challenges that might arise by way of judicial review or anything else. That is nearly two years. It is an astonishingly long time and an unnecessarily long time. The system at the moment is broken insofar as it is not delivering those projects. The examples that spring to mind when we talk about climate, for example, are renewable energy projects, including wind farms. It takes a long time to get a wind farm up and running and, as we stand here, there is not a single operational offshore wind farm in Ireland. That is a shameful statistic. As we look at solar projects, wind projects, onshore as well, and wave projects we hope will come in the future, we need to be able to action them much more quickly than we are. In an ironic way, they are the very tools that will help us combat the climate crisis, reduce our carbon emissions and replace dirty energy with clean and renewable energy. What this Bill does makes perfect sense to me. We will be supporting legislation that is actually going to implement a change in the manner in which we create this critical infrastructure and make it available to the people of Ireland to help them solve problems into the future. God knows we have enough problems to solve. Many significant infrastructural problems have been allowed to languish over a generation, in essence. We need to take action on them. I think of my own area in Dún Laoghaire. I am forever harping on about water quality. We have a Victorian sewer system that means that when there is a high rainfall event or a lot of water, the run-off goes into the sewer system, down to the back of the West Pier in Dún Laoghaire, and an under-seabed pipe pumps the sewage from the West Pier pumping station to the Poolbeg sewage treatment plant, where it is treated and then discharged into the sea. That is fine, but the pipe only has a given capacity. When there is a lot of rain and the run-off also goes into that sewer system, there is overcapacity at the pumping station. There is an attenuation tank that is 70,000 cu. m. It fills up. That is fine, and it holds the sewage until such time as it can be pumped through to Poolbeg, but when there is a lot of rain it fills up. When it is full, there is nowhere for the material to go but into the sea. We have many videos of this big, black slick coming into Dublin Bay off the back of the West Pier when that attenuation tank is full, and more raw sewage flows into it and there is nowhere for it to go but into the sea, in which we fish for our food and swim for recreation and have water sports. The same water that people swim in and eat from is having raw sewage pumped into it. There is no real justification for that except for the fact we have not taken the infrastructural solutions and implemented them to ensure there is a second attenuation tank at the back of the West Pier. That is a relatively straightforward, simple, implementable solution to that problem. The longer term, much more complex, essentially multigenerational and multibillion euro project is to reform our sewerage and water systems so that we recycle water within homes, use sustainable urban drainage systems and ensure we minimise the use of water in real terms. That is a longer term project but we could build a second attenuation tank next to the West Pier pumping station at the gut at the back of the West Pier in Dún Laoghaire, which would solve that problem in the short term. At the moment not only is that overflowing into the sea but the time lapse in informing people who are swimming in the sea is so slow that they will already have swum in their own discharge - I do not know what the right word to use for that is - and they will not know about it until a day later when the tests come back to show there is bacteria in the water. If that is not something from a different age, I do not know what is, and it is solvable. It is exactly this kind of legislation that will help us solve it in the short term. That is a project that will be caught up in the 63-week delay before we can start construction, and that is provided there is not a challenge. On the subject of challenges, I heard some speakers speaking about how there is an attempt to shut down those using the courts to be activists for better standards and regulation and to stop things happening that should not happen. I agree with them that it is important to allow that to happen. I do not think the answer is to cut out judicial review. The answer is in two forms. The first is to have the judicial reviews but to speed them up. We should use a commercial court-style system, as was used in Ireland in the 1990s to speed up commercial cases. That can also be done for judicial reviews against planning systems. However, that also requires an investment in the Judiciary and more judges to hear those cases so they actually happen more quickly. There are cases where the litigants should be told, “This is the way it's going to happen. Here is your timeline. This is when it's going to be heard and if you're not ready, you're the one who loses out.” That can be done to make judicial review more efficient and thereby not deny people their rights of access to the courts to challenge decisions they have a problem with. As we know because they succeed, they are often right about the challenges they bring. The practical import of the challenges they bring is that they slow down the delivery of infrastructure, and there is no need for that process to restrict or inhibit the production of the critical infrastructure that is named in the Bill. Something else that springs to mind, which I frequently speak about, is the notion of an underground metro system for Dublin. The reality is that we need to start it. Because of massive infrastructure projects that have overrun and become problematic, the obvious one being the children's hospital, to a large extent politicians and the public service in Ireland are afraid of large-scale infrastructure projects. This is because they can prove so problematic and are so complex and, to a large extent, because the expertise is not there in the public service and we rely on external services to deliver them, which does not always work. In terms of building the metro, we do not have to implement a 100-stop metro in the morning or something the size of that in Paris, London or somewhere like that. We can do what they do in Paris, which is to build a short line with a small number of stops. This is the first project. For example, if I think of Paris, the line 14, which was built in the past 25 or 30 years, started off with four stops in central Paris. The project is called Météor. It is a driverless train that is deeper, cleaner and fully wheelchair accessible. They built four stops and it now runs all the way from Saint-Lazare in north-west central Paris to Orly Airport. Initially they built a small line and added on a station at each end and then another station and another station. Instead of having a behemoth of an infrastructural project, they had smaller, bite-size projects that were more manageable. Even if such smaller projects do go pear-shaped for some reason, there is a way in which they do not impact on the delivery of the overall ambition over a period of years. These projects can be done, but in order to do them and deliver 21st-century water treatment facilities for people in Dublin, and in order to deliver 21st-century or even 20th-century public transport systems, we have to approach this with some purpose. The Bill is the first step of that process, to my mind. Notwithstanding the concerns some Members have, and these can all be managed and we can look at the safeguards that are there, this is the way in which we get rid of the delays. We target certain projects and at governmental level we identify them and say a certain project is critical, and that for another one we will make the order under section 3 and make it happen. If we can do that, it is a good thing for people in Dublin and throughout the country. If we can deliver those projects that make their lives better and easier and reduce our carbon emissions and delays, it will create a better infrastructural society for us all. If the Bill can do this and if it is a step down that road, then it is a good thing. On this basis alone, I will welcome the Bill and support it as it goes through.

Sentiment score: 0.04