Today I am forced to raise again our concerns about the Government’s 925-page Planning and Development Bill. It should be receiving adequate consideration tonight but we know it will not because the Government is giving us just three hours to consider 177 pages of amendments to this extremely significant legislation. These are amendments we have never had the opportunity to consider in the Dáil.

This developer-led Bill will cause real and lasting damage to our already sub-par planning system. If it is passed as it is, it will actually delay the delivery of homes and transport infrastructure and will risk our energy security. It will remove democracy from aspects of planning and concentrate power in the hands of the Minister. Three hours will not be enough time to tackle these and other flaws, nor will three minutes be enough, which is what I have now.

Instead I want to raise just one issue - something Hollywood's Mark Ruffalo has been campaigning on for years. His issue with what I might call this hulking piece of legislation is the group of new amendments on the importation of liquified natural gas, LNG. This is a domestic issue for us but it is of concern internationally and to Mr. Ruffalo because he is from Pennsylvania in the US, where fracking-sourced LNG terminals have been linked to asthma, rare childhood cancers and adverse birth outcomes. Here at home, the Government is trying to designate floating terminals as strategic infrastructure so that LNG can be imported into Ireland, circumventing normal planning processes.

We know LNG is a dirty fuel. It will increase our emissions and it is harmful to health. The cost of a new LNG facility would be added to people's gas bills at a time when households already struggle to make ends meet. Even if this goes ahead, a new terminal will not be ready for years to come. By the time we would have one built, we would already have greatly increased renewable energy capacity in place, so this is not even a question of energy security. This is about embedding harmful fuels long term into our energy system against all the evidence.

The Government has insisted that existing policy amounts to an LNG moratorium. That argument has never held water, especially not since last week's High Court decision that there is no way of enforcing the moratorium so there is no ban. The Minister, Deputy Ryan, has said he does not think commercial LNG terminals will be installed in Ireland. Respectfully, we do not legislate based on a vibe or a ministerial whim. I am quite frankly shocked at this approach by the Minister with responsibility for climate action. Green Party TDs are sitting across on Government benches now. I am the first person on this side of the House to acknowledge the progress on climate action that has been made due to their presence in government. As a lifelong environmentalist, I welcome that, but that is why I am so concerned to see that they might at the eleventh hour be on the verge of undoing that work. This is not just a problem for the Green Party; it is a problem for all of us.

Will the Government withdraw support for these dangerous LNG amendments and support the Labour Party amendments instead? Will it act on the High Court decision and introduce a cast-iron ban on LNG? Finally, does it accept that three hours is just not long enough to consider this vitally important Bill and these hugely significant new amendments?

What about your bike shed?

As the Deputy rightly says, the Planning and Development Bill will be voted upon in the Dáil tonight. This is after 170 hours of debate. The Bill is hugely significant and has been under work for years. It is vital in terms of streamlining our planning process. I think everybody will accept that. As the Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, has said, and I agree with him, the Bill will be the cornerstone of Irish planning for the coming decades. It represents the most comprehensive review of planning since the current Act was enacted in 2000. It contains important reforms to the planning system, including the introduction of mandatory timelines, a reorganisation of An Bord Pleanála, greater alignment of all tiers of planning and improvements to the judicial review process. It will bring consistency, clarity and transparency to the planning process. I support it and acknowledge the significant work of the Minister and his team and what they have done to get this Bill to this point.

Regarding LNG terminals, the purpose of the Planning and Development Act is to set the legislative framework to enable the most appropriate means of assessment of all forms of development. The LNG provision referred to largely replicates current provision in the Planning and Development Act 2000. Irrespective of Government policy, any party may propose such a facility at any time and this must be assessed if submitted. Identification of a significant and specialist development type such as an LNG terminal and-or storage facility for strategic infrastructure scale assessment does not automatically imply acceptance or prioritisation. In the same manner as gas installations are identified under annexe 1 of the Aarhus Convention, it would be an omission for the planning legislative code simply to ignore this form of development. It is also noted that the November 2023 energy security package recommends that consideration be given to State ownership of a temporary facility.

The Bill represents the most comprehensive review of planning since the current Act was enacted in 2000 and contains important reforms to the planning system, including the introduction of mandatory timelines, a reorganisation of An Bord Pleanála, greater alignment of all tiers of planning and improvements to the judicial review process. The review and reform of planning legislation is a key action of Housing for All. It was underpinned by engagement led by the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage. This included the planning advisory forum, which played a very important role in contributing to the policy provisions outlined in the Bill.

I cannot accept the line that the planning Bill has been considered in full. As the Minister knows, I was very engaged with it on Committee and Report Stages. This is one of the most substantial pieces of legislation the Oireachtas has ever considered but we certainly do not have enough time tonight to debate the massive number of new amendments that we have not had an opportunity to debate before in the Dáil. They were introduced in the Seanad.

With respect, the Minister has not responded to my point about the High Court decision last week, nor about the very valid concerns that have been raised, not only by us in opposition but also by Friends of the Earth this morning, about the LNG terminal amendments. As Friends of the Earth has noted, the new amendments contradict official Government policy. This amounts to gaslighting. There is a contradiction between the Bill with these new amendments and agreed Government policy on LNG. That is something that has been pointed out objectively. Friends of the Earth has pointed to a public poll showing strong public opposition to the LNG terminal. These are the concerns we have not had the opportunity to debate previously in the Dáil. We have only three hours to debate those amendments and all the others tonight. The key questions, to which the Minister has not responded, remain. If the Government is not trying to bring in LNG by the back door, why is it legislating for fast-tracked LNG planning? Why is it failing to legislate for key climate conditions on gas infrastructure as outlined in its own energy security review? It just does not add up and we will not have time to get to the root of what the issue is with these amendments in tonight's deeply curtailed debate. It is really unacceptable.

I want to be very clear. This amendment is to ensure that if there is a massive energy crisis, we would have storage facilities for LNG if required. I am talking about a massive energy crisis. It has nothing to do with fracking. This Government is opposed to fracking. My former colleague Tony McLoughlin brought forward a Bill to ban fracking. This is planning for all eventualities. The planning Bill will help the realisation of offshore and green energy to progress. The big focus is on renewable energy, particularly offshore energy, not LNG and certainly not fracking. The Bill will speed up the process of producing more green energy.

No.