Climate Minister Eamon Ryan has defended the recent significant carbon tax hikes, saying that they are “the right thing to do” and “progressive.”
The remarks were made in the Dáil earlier this week during a discussion on Budget 2022.
“We have to raise tax,” he said.
“We cannot do everything from borrowing…I believe the carbon tax has been the right thing to do not just on the climate side, where it is critical, among a whole range of different tools, but also because it is progressive.”
Ryan went on to explain that, over the next 9 years, the government was due to take in €9.5 billion, with €3 billion of this going to social protection, and €5 billion over 9 years going to retrofitting so people can insulate their houses.
For scale, in a 2019 interview with RTÉ Radio 1, Ryan said that insulating every private home in the country would cost over €50 billion – ten times as much as the carbon tax that will now be allocated. He clarified that this €50 billion figure was not taking into account schools, council houses and work building.
In addition, he said that cheap loans would be offered to individuals so they could alter their homes to green specifications. This was previously covered in a Gript video which can be found below.
The government’s cabinet has just approved Eamon Ryan’s climate bill, which means we can all say “slán anois” to the Irish economy and common sense. Ben Scallan comments. #gripthttps://t.co/EqQmPBdo3n pic.twitter.com/EfIbx9yfJW
— gript (@griptmedia) March 26, 2021
Deputy Carol Nolan hit out at the Minister’s claims, calling the carbon tax hike “unsustainable, unfair and unacceptable.”
“I remind those Deputies who called such measures progressive that there is nothing progressive about the possibility of blackouts,” she said.
“There is nothing progressive about thousands of tonnes of peat being imported from Latvia and Estonia while 10,000 jobs are at risk in our horticulture sector. There is nothing progressive about abandoning farmers or punishing rural people, motorists and agri-contractors with a carbon tax hike that is unsustainable, unfair and unacceptable.
“We are seeing the pursuit of ludicrous objectives when we need pragmatism and constructivism. We have not seen that.”