This issue came up earlier in priority questions. The Environmental Protection Agency, EPA, has recently reported that it cannot include in its modelling up to 9 million tonnes of GHG abatement measures in the Government climate action plan. As a result, it is predicting that we will fall significantly short of our target for 2030. I would be interested to hear the Minister comment on how we can realise those 9 million tonnes.

I agree with the Minister. Some of the deployment of these technologies is proving very effective. The big bombshell in the report was on the land use front. The flexibility that had been available to us of 26 million tonnes has dropped to 9 million tonnes as a result of a reassessment of the impact of land use on emissions. Land use, even with the 8,000 ha of forestry planting and the rewetting of 80,000 acres, will only contribute in a tiny way to our emissions. This is a source of concern. We do not seem to have…

Does the Minister agree that if we read the climate action plan we see tremendous uncertainty on land use? We are speaking about a likely target of 11 million tonnes of emissions in 2030 and a 66% reduction in prospect. This is the target the EU suggests. Where are the policy tools that could conceivably explain to communities how such a 66% reduction could be achieved? Are we creating the uncertainty the Minister rightly says fouls the atmosphere of debate? There are a lot of achievements but if we create great un…

There is a worrying trend in this House to see embracing sustainability and the climate challenge as a conspiracy somehow hatched in Dublin against the future of rural Ireland. The truth is exactly the opposite. It is those who seek to cling to practices and institutions that do not have a future who will lead their communities in the wrong direction. What I like about the vision for rural Ireland pioneered by the Minister, Deputy Humphreys, is that it is taking the courage to portray the path to a resilient future…

I can understand the Minister's point about GP card and the drugs refund covering a lot of cases but medical appliances are a different situation. People who do not qualify for a medical card face huge uncertainty in accessing needed medical appliances for certain conditions. If the entire system cannot be reviewed, would it be possible that medical appliances would get some form of a different structure for dealing sensitively with people who have particular needs for such supports?

I wish to ask the Minister about the development of community pharmacists. During Covid-19, they played a fantastic role. As the Minister probably knows, they feel very aggrieved about financial emergency measures in the public interest, FEMPI, obligations. They also feel there is a potential to develop them. We see GPs under pressure daily. Community pharmacists do seem like a resource we ought to exploit more creatively.

From previous replies, I think the Minister indicated a working group in place during Covid had been repurposed to look at taking advantage of low-hanging fruit in a highly-qualified segment of the population that has community confidence. The HSE is approaching this by looking at one column after another, which is going to be very slow and it will be difficult to make progress. Can the Minister not see his way to broadening the scope of the work a pharmacist can take on so it is much wider than a case-by-case basi…

Can the Minister give me a timeline for when we might see a significant package rather than the drip, drip, drip of individual arenas?

I welcome this debate and the Minister's assurances. He made important points, the first of which was that this situation was evolving and he had already gained significant flexibilities. The second was that Ireland was not tied into plans or targets developed at a single point in time. That was one of the fears held by people who read the detail of some of these targets. The third point, and one the Minister emphasised, was that the obligation to deliver was on member states, not on individuals. Article 16 of the …

One of the things that has been graciously welcomed in recent years is the expansion of autism spectrum disorder, ASD, units in many of our schools. However, I am finding that this expansion is displacing childcare facilities and that there is a scarcity of places, particularly for younger children. This is rampant across my constituency and I am sure it is the same across the constituencies of others. Should the national development plan, NDP, capital, which will not be triggered until 2025, be brought forward so …

Many schools that had spare classrooms allowed childcare facilities to be established there but now the priority is to children in the schools, so they have to ask those childcare providers to leave to put in the ASD units.

Not for childcare.

That would be welcome.

Mankind has always sought to bend nature to its will, but what has changed, of course, is the global industrial scale on which we are now wreaking unintended damage, which is enormous. The way in which we meet our needs for nutrition, travel, shelter and comfort is doing huge damage. It is estimated that we are on course to use more materials in one year than nature can replenish in three, and you do not need to be Einstein to see the consequences of that. The impact of overstretched nature is everywhere to be seen…

I am delighted to have the opportunity to speak. I will start by thanking the Minister, Deputy O'Gorman, and his colleagues for the work they are doing on our behalf. If one looks at any European country and the challenges they face, it is the political issue of our time. The Minister, Deputy O'Gorman, has handled it extremely sensitively in a very difficult environment. The figures speak for themselves. The Minister has managed to provide emergency accommodation for 62,000 Ukrainians and 20,000 people under intern…

I am sure that, like many Deputies, the Tánaiste is seeing how growing participation in the workplace is exposing weaknesses in childcare supply, particularly in rapidly growing areas such as those I represent on the northern fringe of Dublin. When will the details of the capital programme that is provided for under the NDP for childcare be outlined? When will we see legislation for the childcare development authority, which is part of the programme for Government?

I welcome the Tánaiste's initiative to have a consultative forum on international security. His selection of Louise Richardson as chairperson for that is a good one. Her biography demonstrates she is a committed reformer, decisive in action and not easily browbeaten by those who would seek to divert her. She will be a good chair. It is time we had a serious conversation on all dimensions of international security, foreign policy, security policy and defence policy. Ireland comes to the debate as the most open econo…

Everyone will agree that the world has changed dramatically in recent years. In that context, I will ask about the national development plan, NDP. Funding is not now a problem but there are huge capacity constraints. How does the Department plan for us to break out of the siloed thinking that has hampered much of our investment in the past?

In short, the Department is saying, "God's in his heaven - All's right with the world!" I invite the Minister of State to challenge the thinking that lay behind that answer. The reality is we are seeing transformative change in the world we live in. There is a new expectation, for example, regarding offshore wind, or our capacity to build compact developments that do not just see takeaways for ten years before schools or childcare are developed. We have not got a strategy for exploiting broadband, which the Departm…

I welcome the changes made to the delivery board but that board is essentially focusing on projects we have already signed up to. The reality is there are huge infrastructural bottlenecks that were not anticipated because of the change of expectations. We are now trying to deliver a 51% reduction in emissions, for example. That is much more ambitious than what we had previously. We need to embrace changes in land use, which will be a major challenge for farmers and others if we do not have significant investment pr…