approved by 86% of party members who attended a specially convened conference in Dublin's Mansion House, after which the party entered government for the first time. On 14 June 2007, he was named as Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government in the new coalition. Leader of Green Party Following the general election of 2007, Trevor Sargent resigned as leader of the Green Party. The following leadership election was contested by Gormley and Patricia McKenna, and the Green Party announced that in the postal ballot he received 478 votes to McKenna's 263. Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government As the new Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Gormley took over the responsibility for the decision to allow the excavation of national monuments near the historical site of the Hill of Tara to facilitate the construction of the M3 motorway. On his final day in office, outgoing minister Dick Roche signed an order which allowed a newly discovered National Monument at Lismullin near Tara to be studied and then destroyed to make way for the building of the motorway. Gormley stated that he was unable for legal reasons to reverse this order. Green Party TD Ciarán Cuffe expressed his dissatisfaction with the former Minister Roche's decision and expressed his hope that Gormley could reverse it. Gormley appointed a long-standing critic of the M3 route, Dr. Conor Newman of NUIG, to oversee the archaeological work as part of a special committee on the Lismullen site. In 2009, the Tara-Skryne Valley was designated Ireland's first Landscape Conservation Area by Gormley, prohibiting shopping malls and retail parks from being constructed in the area. In September 2007, he announced regulations introducing reductions in energy consumption and carbon emissions for all new homes in new building regulations. New homes are to be 40% more energy efficient, which will reduce the carbon footprint of each house by 40% also. The new regulations are also set to make renewable energy mandatory for all new build homes. In his leader's speech to the Green Party conference in April 2008, he provoked a walk-out of the Chinese Ambassador and diplomatic delegation by calling for solidarity with the people of Tibet and referring to Tibet as a nation. On 6 March 2008, Gormley established a Referendum Commission for the first referendum on the Treaty of Lisbon. The Minister did not restore the original remit of the