Ms Siobhan Curran:

I thank the Deputy for hosting the launch of our report. In terms of loss and damage, there is a significant opportunity now that we did not see last year. As the Deputy mentioned, loss and damage only got on COP’s agenda formally last year.

I will make a few points about COP28. A block of developed and developing countries have been in opposition at COP. Unfortunately, we occupy that space within the EU. We want to see the EU being a leader on the basis of equity and climate justice at this COP. The US has been obstructive in the discussions on loss and damage, to the point that, at the transitional committee meeting, it opposed wording whereby richer countries would have an obligation to pay into a loss and damage fund. Now, the wording from the transitional committee is that richer countries are “urged” to pay. That should be the minimum of what is required. We would like there to be an obligation. We just want to see a commitment to an obligation on richer countries to move first. As to whether a high-ambition coalition might discuss something like that, there are different options that could be discussed and pioneered at COP. Where trust is concerned, developing countries need to see richer countries committing, stop obstructing and putting their money where their mouths are. The next COP is a perfect opportunity to make pledges. We have heard that the EU will make a substantial pledge. We have not heard what that figure is yet, but I hope it is at the ambitious level that is needed. Ireland has an important opportunity to play a role as a progressive state within the EU.

Climate justice has to be at the heart of these decisions, but it keeps getting left out. In the transitional committee’s proposal, which will be considered at COP28, human rights language was removed. It does not make sense to have processes at the UNFCCC that do not have human rights or gender equality at their heart. The whole point of a loss and damage fund is to help the people who need it on the ground and who are paying the price for the climate crisis. That is what it keeps coming back to. Some of the poorest people and poorest communities, be they in Pakistan where a third of the country was under water, are the ones paying the price. Since the nineties, richer countries have been committing to paying first but have not delivered.

At the next COP, we want to see Ireland making a pledge and playing a constructive role in the negotiations and a final commitment being made to a fund that is actually capitalised and into which richer countries pay.