For the last 10 years, Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil Governments have been lucky enough to preside over very healthy public finances. How they have spent – or misspent - our great wealth is another matter, though clearly the anger and frustration that we saw on our streets last week means that, even with the vast resources at the Government’s disposal, it clearly is not getting it right.

It has been in its gift to splash the cash whenever its wants. There were tax breaks for big developers and burger barons in the last budget and more sectoral handouts this week, but where is the bailout package for PAYE workers to protect their incomes, to reduce their bills with targeted energy credits and measures to adopt solar and retrofitting at scale? Too many people simply cannot afford to even consider getting SEAI grants.

If successive Governments had taken our climate commitments seriously, we would not be in the cost-of-living crisis that we are now, with some of the highest energy prices in Europe. We have a budget for our emissions in this country. We have legally binding targets to reduce our emissions, or at least I thought we did. Our carbon budget is very much in the red and the Minister has admitted that we are going to miss our 2030 emissions targets by as much as 50%. The climate change and fiscal advisory councils have warned us that fines are going to come in, ranging from €8 billion to €26 billion by 2030. Who is the Government going to ask to pay for it? It will be PAYE workers again who will have to shoulder that burden.

Yesterday was overshoot day. If the rest of the world consumed at the rate that Ireland has since 1 January, we would have run out of resources globally on 14 April. That is a month earlier than it would have been last year. Would the Tánaiste tolerate this lack of budgetary indiscipline when it comes to our public finances? He has just said that we cannot keep spending more. Of course, he would not tolerate this but the manner in which this Government approaches everything to do with climate, environment and biodiversity gives the impression that we have loads of carbon budget to spare for all these highly polluting new projects that it wants to pursue. New private wires laws are going to turbocharge data centre expansion and imported fracked gas through the new liquefied natural gas reserve will power them. Once again, it will be ordinary PAYE workers who will pay the price for all of this in their energy bills.

Most worryingly, we see the Government deciding that it just does not want to bother with the climate Act at all when it comes to large critical infrastructure projects. This Government has consistently scapegoated environmental concerns arising via the planning process or judicial reviews as the root cause of its inability to deliver anything meaningful, but none of the delays relating to the new children’s hospital, for example, were due to environmental objections. There are any number of reasons it takes time to deliver large projects but dumping on environmentalists and environmental law is just dishonest.

We all want to see critical infrastructure delivered and delivered quickly, but will the Government reverse this decision to disapply the climate Act from the Critical Infrastructure Bill and can he tell me when PAYE workers are going to get a break from the Government?

Hear, hear.

I thank Deputy Ahern for his question. I will reiterate my point that while there has been much discussion this week about various sectors that are vital to the Irish economy, whether they are farmers or fishers, hauliers or the likes, the fundamental point here is that this Government's package supports everybody because the PAYE worker and everybody else in this country needs food on the shelves. They need the ports operating, not blockaded. They need to make sure that our supply chains work. Many of the PAYE workers pulled up at petrol pumps this morning where the cost of petrol and diesel, while still too high, is lower than it was before we voted. In fairness, the Labour Party supported the cut on the excise this week as well. Crucially, measures that we take to try to somewhat contain - because no Government can fully insulate - the impact of very significant rising costs caused by the war in Iran help keep inflation down or at least moderate the growth of inflation. That does genuinely have a benefit for all of us in society, including PAYE workers.

I am really pleased that there is a meeting taking place tomorrow at the Labour Employer Economic Forum, LEEF. As the Deputy knows, it is the body that brings together trade union representatives, employer representatives and senior members of the Government, including myself and the Taoiseach. It is more important than ever that we have really good and intensive engagement. I mean this sincerely: at challenging times in the history of this State, the trade union movement has stepped up time and time again and played a positive role. That does not mean, by the way, that we always agree on everything. I do not want to kill their street cred and I certainly do not agree with them on everything but having constructive engagement in process at times of challenge is something I value. This Government values it and I think this Oireachtas values it. I heard the comments of the general secretary of ICTU this week as well in relation to that. We should challenge ourselves, after the week that this country has had, to make sure we have very robust and constructive structures in place for ongoing engagement. I want to say that too.

In relation to renewables, I will start with a positive. Half of all electricity generated in this country in March came from renewables. It was the first time. I think it was 49%, just under half. We are making some progress. We need to do more and we need to do it faster because - and I agree with the Deputy on this point - as long as we are dependent on dirty fossil fuels from abroad, there is a security issue in every sense, including an economic security issue. However, we are making some progress under the work of the Minister, Deputy O'Brien. We saw 58,000 homes retrofitted last year. We have seen a record demand this year, with over 29,000 applications already in. We have improved the grants. I am sure that the Deputy was hearing from his constituents that it was cumbersome to have to do everything together. I was certainly hearing it from mine. As a result of those changes, the approval of the grants for heat pumps is up 95%, roof insulation is up 81% and cavity wall insulation is up 62% as well. In fact, in March alone there were more than 6,000 grant applications for windows and more than 6,000 grant applications for doors. These are encouraging signs.

On the issue of critical infrastructure, critical infrastructure can include renewable energy as well. I genuinely think that we can have different perspectives on this. It is taking far too long to deliver transformational projects, including transformational projects from an energy point of view. The Critical Infrastructure Bill tries to get that balance right.

I thank the Tánaiste. We welcome the LEEF meeting next week and the Labour Party will be supporting our trade unions here when they are looking for pay rises, when they are looking for remote and flexible working rights.

We are calling for free and cheap public transport and an expansion of those types of schemes. The Tánaiste did not indicate that the Government will continue to abide by the climate Act when it comes to our critical infrastructure. There are reasons other than those relating to environmental laws for projects in this country being delayed. A lack of resourcing of planning authorities, regulatory bodies and the courts over the past ten years has resulted in projects being delayed. It is not fair to dump on environmental laws.

It is not as if our rivers and waterways are in pristine condition or that our biodiversity is in a strong position. We need the climate Act. The whole point of section 15 of that Act is that public bodies can be held to account in the context of performing their duties in conjunction with our climate obligations. That should not get in the way of the construction of critical infrastructure. I ask the Government to look at this again and to reverse the decision in relation to the Critical Infrastructure Bill and section 15 of the Climate Act.

At least your politics are honest in the sense that we can either agree or disagree on certain policy areas and you can criticise us and we can criticise you. You do not come into this House and constantly suggest the abolition of significantly important taxes and come up with a load of new spending ideas at the same time. That is not a sustainable position. It was very interesting earlier in the week that the House did not divide when it came to some of these issues. It did not divide along the lines of the big bad old Government over here and all of the Opposition together over there. We were better than that, or at least many of us were, in terms of trying to engage constructively. I appreciate that.

They voted no confidence in you. You may forget that. Are you serious?

Deputy Doherty, you had your go. It is their time.

This is Simon and his wee-----

Stop, please. Go ahead, Tánaiste.

This week the Sinn Féin Party took to social media to criticise Labour and the Social Democrats. I thought that was pretty pathetic.

You must be more worried about Micheál than we thought.

Come on, Pearse, give everybody a chance in this House. No bully-boy tactics, please. We support the Critical Infrastructure Bill. We will be happy to tease through the detail of it. The Deputy is right in that there are lots of factors involved. At times, environmental law can be a factor when there are projects we need to deliver at real speed. This is not about all projects; it is about those that are deemed to be critical. As the Minister takes the Bill through the House, he will engage constructively and tease through the detail.