Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I agree with the broad thrust of what the Deputy is saying whereby 50% of the vehicles being sold in the current market are typically characterised as SUVs. They are larger, have a bigger environmental footprint and contain a greater amount of steel. There are concerns around safety for pedestrians and others. If a person is hit by an SUV versus a lighter and smaller car, there are real implications to that. Therefore, I absolutely agree that our strategy should be towards moving to lighter vehicles.

I would also argue for a move towards more car sharing rather than outright car ownership because most of our cars are parked for 95% of the time. There would be real efficiencies as well as cost savings for the public if we can incentivise and support that, which we will do through further measures.

I will continue my discussions with the Ministers for Finance, and Public Expenditure, National Development Plan Delivery and Reform to examine the various tax and other incentive systems we have. They are evolving and have changed quite significantly in the past two years in terms of which cars are eligible for the VRT rebate. We will continue to review and evolve this towards moving to a more sustainable transport fleet.

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