The Government is expecting to run a surplus of €10 billion in the public finances this year and a further surplus of €16.2 billion next year. This money should not be locked away into a long-term fund serving the strategic interests of other countries. Part of this surplus should be invested in infrastructure that unlocks the massive economic potential that we have in our offshore renewable electricity sector. For example, by 2037 it is estimated that there could be 5,400 jobs supported in the Atlantic region through offshore wind development, with a financial dividend of €4.2 billion. This is according to a study funded by Enterprise Ireland. It will happen only with a clear signal from the Government setting out specific targets for the installed capacity of offshore wind post 2030. Targets to 2050 exist but they are not specific. We should set aside part of the €26.2 billion to support critical electricity grid infrastructure off our coast and to aid significant upgrade works at our ports. Currently, Belfast is the only suitable port on the island of Ireland for the development of offshore wind energy. We cannot simultaneously build multiple offshore wind farms from a single port.

The Minister will respond by stating the Government has set up the offshore wind delivery task force to deliver our offshore wind ambitions. From my experience, such cross-departmental task forces work only when the Minister sits at the table. With all due respect to the Minister, Deputy Ryan, who is effectively running three Departments, co-chairing the International Energy Agency and keeping an eye on the Taoiseach and Tánaiste and the shenanigans within the Green Party, he cannot do everything. Is it any wonder he grabs 40 winks here in the Chamber when he can?

The most effective way for Ireland to take a leadership role in the offshore renewable energy sector is to establish an offshore renewable development authority similar to IDA Ireland and something that was adopted unanimously by Dáil Éireann in December 2021. This new authority would drive a fully co-ordinated national action plan and would have responsibility ranging from research and development through to supply chain and commercial deployment of renewable energy, ensuring that Ireland becomes the leading global clean energy exporter. Last week President Biden said Ireland's famous 40 shades of green are being supplemented by green energy, agriculture and jobs. We can make this a reality if we lead directly from the front through the office of the Taoiseach. That is the type of strategic leadership that is needed to deliver on what President Biden outlined here last week.

I agree with an awful lot of what Deputy Naughten has said, although I think a cheap shot at Deputy Ryan is beneath the Deputy. I have huge time for the Deputy, as he knows. The ambition this country has for offshore renewable is in large part due to Deputy Eamon Ryan's relentless pursuit of this agenda for a long time in politics and long before this Government, and his vision in this regard in wanting to make Ireland Europe's capital of offshore renewable generation. We will achieve this. I agree with Deputy Naughten on the challenge to get there around licensing and the need to set up new entities which are on their way to being set up. Boards have been put in place and I hope that soon a chief executive will be in place for MARA. Of course there is a range of other regulatory issues that need to be resolved and these are being worked through.

The offshore wind task force is attended by the Minister, Deputy Ryan, regularly. He has asked me to come along to the next one. My Department will get more involved in this from an enterprise point of view. Offshore wind is not solely a climate change initiative that can decarbonise our economy and society. It is also a huge industrial opportunity in terms of a competitive advantage for Ireland in the future being able to provide limitless amounts of clean renewable energy coming in from off our coast. The assembly of this enormous infrastructure to be built, I hope in Irish ports, and then assembled in time as fixed and floating off our coastline will have a transformational effect on the Irish economy in terms of employment in parts of the country that do not have huge employment at the moment and in terms of new clusters of industrial activity that will want to be connected to it. I am thinking of places such as the Shannon Estuary, Cork Harbour, Rosslare, Killibegs and other ports off the west of Ireland. There is enormous opportunity. The Department will bring recommendations to the Government in the coming weeks on a proposal to develop an enterprise and industrial strategy on offshore wind to complement the work the task force is doing in terms of trying to make it happen.

Deputy Naughten is right that hundreds of millions of euro, if not billions of euro, need to be spent on infrastructure. I do not think the Government will be found wanting on this. The private sector is willing to spend a lot of this money because it is a good investment. We will ensure that if there is market failure, whether in our ports or in other infrastructure, the State will intervene when necessary. I assure the House that this is not only a focus of the Department of the Minister, Deputy Ryan, although he is leading on it, but also a focus of mine and of the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, which is assisting in terms of the licensing and permits that are necessary.

If it is a good investment for the private sector, which I believe it is, it is a good investment for our money also, rather than investing it in other countries. Last Saturday Germany stopped producing electricity from its nuclear power plants, leaving it highly dependent on fossil fuels, much of which are imported. At the same time, Ireland has great untapped potential off the west coast to meet this demand. We have an indigenous Irish company, Supernode, that wants to develop a transmission network across Europe to export wind energy generated off our Atlantic coast and deliver it directly onto the European grid. Instead of forging ahead, the Government is undermining confidence in the sector by moving to a new plan-led system that requires the drawing up of maps indicating where new offshore wind farms are to be built. This is commendable but we still do not know who will draw up these maps. We have had to wait for a decision from the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage on this. I do not need to remind the Minister that this is the exact same Department that is yet to deliver on the revised onshore wind energy guidelines that he and I signed off in May 2017, six years ago.

In terms of onshore wind, this country's record is not bad. We are one of the best performing countries in Europe. We provide approximately 30% of our electricity needs from onshore renewable wind farms currently and we will do a lot more. Now we are moving into solar also. I take some of the criticism but I also want to put on the record the delivery we have seen in recent years in terms of onshore wind.

In terms of a plan-led system, we are moving ahead on the remainder of the development of offshore renewable infrastructure on the basis of a plan-led system for very good reason. We have very clear advice from the Attorney General on this. What we do not want is to have permits being challenged in the courts that delay things for years. We need to have certainty that when we permit the building of enormous infrastructure offshore, which is what this is, we will be able to face down legal challenges quickly so we can move on and ensure the permits are actioned. That is the thinking behind a plan-led and State-led system, which in time developers will very much row in behind because they will see the legal sense of it.