Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

We would like to agree on an all-party basis, through the Joint Committee on Climate Action, a target price for carbon for 2030 which would probably be €80 per tonne, but I do not want to set it here, and the trajectory by which we will get to that point. I would very much like that to be agreed on an all-party basis. It is not dissimilar to introducing water charges. When people see what this will mean it will require a political consensus to make it happen and a real campaign for the public to understand it. At the moment the carbon tax is €20 per tonne. If we go to €80 per tonne we will bring about very significant and permanent increases in the cost of living for the majority of people. It will be much more expensive to run a car, heat a house and to use electricity. That will have impacts, particularly on older people and on rural communities. It will be much more expensive to run a business. There will be real issues for farmers and for haulage. We have seen in Australia, for example, how governments failed to do what we would like to do because of the politics surrounding it. The best way to make this happen is to agree on an all-party basis that we are going to do this and for every party to sign up to how we phase it in between now and 2030 so that we can stand together in explaining to the public why this is the right thing to do.

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