Thomas Pringle (Donegal, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State to the House for the conclusion of this debate. I am grateful for the opportunity to continue with my Second Stage speech on the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development (Amendment) Bill 2021.

Last Wednesday, when first speaking on the Bill, I referred to several issues, including how disenfranchised the general public are in these discussions because of the technical nature of these debates. I also said climate action campaigns have been fairly middle class with many measures targeting the working class and people with less money. I wonder if those are more or less likely to be contributing to climate change.

Earlier this month, during the "Today with Claire Byrne" radio programme, the Minister for the Environment, Climate and Communications, Deputy Eamon Ryan, spoke out against low-cost flights. The conversation was around meeting climate change targets and the need to change the way we travel. The Minister suggested that €10 flights will end. On special low-cost flights he said, "No, they won't be going for €10, I don't expect that, but people will still be flying." He was, of course, talking about the need to halve emissions in transport.

I have been thinking about this. It is not the person or family who travel for a sun holiday on a special low-cost flight who are causing the most damage to the climate. Why should they be deprived of an opportunity to travel when businesspeople can travel all over regularly? Why can flight costs not be linked to a person’s air miles? The more one flies, the more one pays because the more one is contributing to aviation emissions. The less frequent fliers are those who can least afford to travel. Why should they be punished? If someone can afford three holidays per year, he or she should be charged more for that privilege. Low-cost flights have opened up travel opportunities for people who may not previously have been able to fly abroad. It is complete snobbery to suggest that it is the low-cost flights which are causing more damage to the environment.

The cost of flying should be linked to a person's air miles. If people are travelling for business, it becomes just another expense. If they are travelling for pleasure, they can afford to pay more. If someone is privately jetting around the place, he or she should have huge levies and contributions to make. We must stop blaming the general population for the pollution of the richer and wealthier. The Bill does not even cover international aviation and shipping. These areas of transport are not even included in the definitions but the Minister was already on air talking down to those who buy low-cost flights.

I thank Johnny McElligott from the Safety Before LNG group for getting in touch this morning about the petition for Ireland to propose a global ban on fracking at the UN. He said:

When deciding at the Cabinet in the coming weeks on a policy against fracked gas imports, as was agreed in the programme for Government, it would be the appropriate time to decide on the ask that was made directly by grassroots activists on Earth Day to the Government which was to take the opportunity to propose the adoption of a strong UN resolution for a global ban on fracking on climate-mitigation, public-health, environmental-protection and human-rights grounds.

This is a measure that the 2020 programme for Government and widespread public opinion support, and that scientific evidence shows increasingly to be necessary. A call for a global ban on fracking would set Ireland on course to become a global climate leader. The Minister for Foreign Affairs, Deputy Coveney, has already explicitly informed the United Nations Security Council that Ireland will take "a practical and action-orientated approach” to climate action. When he addressed the Berlin Climate and Security Conference in June 2020, he stated:

We must remember that those who have contributed least to climate change - people from least-developed countries and small island developing states - are the most exposed to its consequences. Those most at risk have the least capacity to respond. Protecting the most vulnerable and safeguarding their human rights must be at the heart of genuinely inclusive global response. With climate already driving insecurity, we need the United Nations and the Security Council to play their part. On the Security Council, Germany has shown great leadership on climate and security. Ireland, as a newly elected member, will work hard on the council to take this agenda forward. ... We are only ten years away from the deadline that we set for ourselves in the 2030 agenda. The decade of action is upon us. Now is the time to act.

When we look back on our record, I wonder if we will see that we have acted. I was on the climate committee when Professor Robert Howarth explained that importing fracked gas would leave a carbon-equivalent footprint at least 44% greater than importing coal over a 20-year period. True climate action is about looking at the impact of our decisions. We need victories against the fossil fuel sector to bring the people along in this journey. We need to think globally and act locally.

Last week, there were yet another two depressing reports published. The Global Energy Review by the International Energy Agency, IEA, showed that carbon dioxide emissions are predicted to rise by 1.5 billion tonnes in 2021. This increase will reverse most of the decline seen in 2020, which we know was due to Covid. The report of the UN's World Meteorological Organization, Global Climate 2020, was also published. The Secretary General of the UN, António Guterres, said:

This report shows that we have no time to waste. The climate is changing, and the impacts are already too costly for people and the planet. This is the year for action.

That is perhaps the understatement of the century. Will we look back on this time and see that Ireland acted? I hope we will. However, I do not know whether this Bill will provide the impetus to make that happen. I am concerned the Bill does not refer to justice actions. It provides the perfect opportunity to have these enshrined as the Government's policy but, instead, they have been left behind. That is a worrying omen for the future.

We will be taking actions with this legislation which will make ordinary and poor people responsible for climate action. They are the people who can bring about these changes if the Government puts in place a system which will make them able to bring about the necessary changes. That is what we need to do in the time we have left in the next year or two. I hope we can but I think the jury is still out.

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