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LAST UPDATE | 28 May 2024
FINE GAEL AND Fianna Fáil have sat out a climate hustings for Ireland’s MEP candidates ahead of the European election next week.
Neither of the two largest government parties sent a representative to a debate held online over Zoom this afternoon organised by the climate activism organisation Friends of the Earth Ireland.
The campaign group said it invited all of Ireland’s major political parties with candidates in the EU election to send a representative. The parties with a candidate in attendance were the Green Party, Sinn Féin, Labour, the Social Democrats, and People Before Profit, alongside Independent Clare Daly.
The Journal contacted the press offices of Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil this morning to ask why they had not put a candidate forward for the hustings but neither party has yet responded at the time of publication.
Friends of the Earth chief executive Oisín Coghlan told the hustings that his understanding was that the parties had tried to find a candidate but could not identify someone with availability, and said it was a pity that they were not in attendance.
Green Party candidate Grace O’Sullivan, whose party is in coalition with Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil in the Dáil, remarked during the hustings that it was regrettable that the other parties weren’t participating to have a “rigorous debate”.
Labour candidate Aodhan Ó Riordáin agreed, saying it was a “real shame that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, with all the candidates that they have – which is much more than Labour – haven’t bothered to show up for this debate today”.
A question to the candidates asking them to name one climate policy that would be their biggest priority, if elected, prompted a range of different answers, from free public transport to limiting militarisation to bringing forward the timeline of the EU’s 2050 target for climate neutrality.
Sinn Féin’s Lynn Boylan said that there are good existing intentions around climate action but that they tend to rely on either individual measures or market mechanisms and she said the “key thing” needed is “tackling the corporate interests” stifling climate action.
Aodhán Ó Ríordáin of Labour briefly expressed his worry about the rise of the far-right in Europe, which he said is focused only on anti-immigration measures but also climate denial. He then raised the role of transport in the climate transition and said he would advocate for free public transport and pushing for a switch away from private cars.
Social Democrats candidate Sinéad Gibney honed in on greenhouse gas emissions reductions, saying that she would want to see rapid emissions cuts in legislation and bring forward the 2050 climate neutrality goal to a sooner date, as well as ensuring that climate action does not create inequalities in society.
Independent Clare Daly raised the carbon footprint of militarisation, saying that a move towards “turbo charging” defence risks producing huge volumes of greenhouse gas emissions.
Brian O’Boyle of People Before Profit seconded Lynn Boylan on the call to take on corporate interests. He said that the EU has allowed too much privatisation, particularly in energy, and that it should scrap the practice of carbon trading. He was the first to give, as he said, a “shoutout” to farmers, who he said are mostly “cognisant of the need to have climate initiatives” but are “also really squeezed”.
Grace O’Sullivan of the Greens said that there has been a “disgusting and unbelievable” push away from the European Green Deal from right-wing parties in the parliament, including the European People’s Party that Fine Gael belongs to, and pointed to her priority areas as the parliament’s chief negotiator on the Environment Action Programme – mitigation, adaptation, circular economy, zero pollution, biodiversity, and reducing the footprint of production and consumption.
O’Sullivan also welcomed the EU withdrawing from the Energy Charter Treaty, an agreement that was made in 1994 which has allowed fossil fuel companies to take lawsuits seeking compensation if policy measures are seen as damaging to their business. Making use of the Zoom format for the debate, Sinn Féin’s Lynn Boylan entered a swift message in the response box: “Minister Eamon Ryan is currently defending Ireland’s membership in the High Court case I have taken against the State [on its support for the ECT].”
The candidates unanimously agreed that they would support a European Commission proposal for emissions reductions of at least 90% emissions reduction by 2040 and to push for net-zero well before 2050.
After a discussion on cutting fossil fuels, particularly pushing back on the Irish government’s eyeing up of LNG as a “back up” energy option, the debate turned to farming and who they believe is best placed to communicate with farmers about climate action.
Boylan called on the media to steer away from “clickbait” that can stir up division and polarisation and also took aim at lobbyists. “When you talk to farmers, they want to make a living and put a roof over their head and pass the farm on to the next generation, so how do we create the framework where that is sustainable and financially viable for them – but it’s really difficult to have those conversations with some of the corporate interests in the agricultural world,” she said, adding that “when you talk with farmers directly, they’re very different to some of those corporate bodies”.
Sinéad Gibney of the Social Democrats talked about party leader Holly Cairns’ background as a farmer. “She represents part of the farming community who I think are not depicted in these media debates that Lynn’s describing where there are so many in the farming community who want to see this change but have livelihoods to protect, families to support, and who need to be brought along. I think our policies are informed by that representation that Holly brings and that’s something I will bring to the parliament myself as well.”
Grace O’Sullivan talked about her late father being a farmer and a member of the Irish Farmers’ Association (IFA), saying she has “always had a good relationship with farmers even though we have very different views”.
She said she had “really heavily influenced” Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael MEPs to vote for the Nature Restoration Law – “and, as Lynn knows”, she said, addressing the Sinn Féin candidate, she was “shocked” to see Sinn Féin’s Chris MacManus vote against it.
Aodhán Ó Ríordáin said he believes the farming industry is “not well led”: “I think some of the very personalised political statements by the likes of the IFA are really regrettable and don’t help anybody, and I would challenge them to have a proper discussion which is actually based about the future of all of our families, of all of our people, of our collective humanity.”
Brian O’Boyle said farmers have “a lot of wisdom and knowledge about what needs doing” and should be listened to about the challenges they face. He said that the Common Agricultural Payment (CAP) should be reformed to target assistance to small and medium farmers to “reduce inequality instead of reinforcing it”.
Clare Daly seconded the idea of “listening” to farmers and said politicians need to “enable farmers to make their transition”, adding that it was “really regrettable that the current parliament rolled back on what was already incredibly weak provisions” on nature. “Farmers want a healthy environment which protects nature as well, so I think you deal with them by listening to the different nuances, accepting where the problems come from, and explaining a more just solution for for their issues.”
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So if they do stay in the customs Union what exactly has the last 20 odd months being all about?
@P.J. Nolan: what was the point of the whole referendum if they were just going to dismiss the largest vote in the history of British democracy, which is now dead.
@Danny Tagert: another referendum, ironically, would be extremely democratic. It would take the current will of the people into account after 20 months of brexit education.
@P.J. Nolan: They basically said ‘we’ll negotiate’, the EU didn’t crack as they expected (delusion and entitlement there), so they said the EU wasn’t being reasonable. The law said there was no impasse to this, the EU weren’t going to give in against their own interests and rightly so. The UK govt said they were waiting for a solution to pop up. There wasn’t and isn’t one. So basically the UK went into negotiations and dragged it out before accepting that there wasn’t a solution. If hey left customs union they’d need a hard border. Both options were unacceptable. The referendum’s question was too general and not planned properly.
@P.J. Nolan: The vote was for either staying in or out of the EU. Staying in the single market or the customs union was never mentioned. The people were not given all the facts about leaving the EU.
@Danny Tagert:
In fairness Danny lies were told on both sides, surely another vote now that the position is clearer is true democracy?
@P.J. Nolan: Referenda in the uk are non binding. They can just ignore it….
@Shougeki:
Theoretically yes but in reality no, especially given the waifer thin majority even including DUPes.
Britain have a brexit plan? Either way, Theresa Maybe will be under the bus (metaphorically speaking).
@Brian Lilly: That’s what she’s there for. A Brexit prophylactic for her betters.
@Brian Lilly:
Everyone in Ireland seems to dislike Teresa May.- Everything she does is wrong. Varadkar is highly critical.
But do bear in mind,
1) she was pro remain.
2) When she goes, then what.?
Vote again.. Sure we git loads of chances to get it right.. Well, the European right…
@Willy Malone: You’ve had 2 goes so far and it’s 1- all; it’s about time for a decider!
It can take a while for sense and sanity to dawn on politicians.
Eventually, Britain will have a form of nominal Brexit, Brexit in name and removed from any real influence and decision making within the EU. It will be a Brexit with significant downsides and no upside.
The madness of Brexit too time to be exposed. Nigel Farage is good a fake facts, followed closely by Boris Johnson.
@Michael Lang: Brexit was down to one thing and one thing only. It was the changes forced on ordinary people that put their communities through severe change quickly to the point that people feel like foreigners in their own country and having to pay for the privilege. It had nothing to do with money in their pockets promised by certain politicians. Those changes made the last few years of my mother’s life hell so I know what people were saying. Its something that people here have no experience of….yet.
@Patrick J. O’Rourke: ” It was the changes forced on ordinary people that put their communities through severe change quickly to the point that people feel like foreigners in their own country and having to pay for the privilege”
It is dismaying that this did happen as politicians were living in a bubble and failed to see that there are only so many institutions they are accountable to.
“Whereas backlash arguments address the harm judicial
decisions do to social-change movements, Roe’s critics focus on
the damage done by judicial intervention to the larger society.
This criticism, which the Article calls the “beyond backlash”
argument, has profound legal consequences. Justice Antonin
Scalia has woven this argument into a demand for the overruling
of Roe. In the broader legal academy, scholars believe that post Roe
polarization provides a powerful warning about the
consequences of particular interpretive methods—particularly,
when the Court decides too much too soon. Forty years after Roe,
the decision serves as a central example of the dangers of judicial
review.” Polarization politics
https://scholarlycommons.law.wlu.edu/wlulr/vol71/iss2/11/
I would have thought that our politicians would have given 20 minutes of their time to look at how societies become polarized by referendum and some never really recover as it sets in motion crippling dynamics in society. We are too small of a nation to be split by entitlement politics and to sleepwalk as the British did into overreaching decisions based on a misguided question.
@Patrick J. O’Rourke: That’s absolute and utter rubbish. Those communities are suffering due to Tory austerity. Farage and the other reactionary fools blamed the outsider. Well sorry, Europeans have seen enough of that guff before and we’re not tolerating it.
@Danny Rafferty: Now you’re talking rubbish. What I witnessed with my mother and her close community is actually too distressing for me to detail here. When what you’ve known as a classic civilised community is destroyed by, and living in fear of migrants then they want it back. I saw same happening in many places and predicted Brexit years before it happened. It had nothing to do with what you say. You must be young.
@Patrick J. O’Rourke: I have no doubt many communities have borne much more than their fair share PJ, but no style of Brexit touted is actually going to do anything for those communities. The highly questionable policies put forward still envisage +100K per year. 60% of immigration will still remain uncontrolled, and Tory policies will still ravage the JAM communities.
Brexit is pure reactionary rubbish and lies, but defend it you’ve nothing else to do this evening.
Theresa may is running around like a headless chicken,she’s trying to keep her own party from imploding and keep Arlene the tyrant happy as well.could be possible in a few months that Britain might just have a second referendum on brexit
@dick dastardly: Yes and using chemical attacks as a distraction from her own problems.
It is so Brexity, I can’t believe that it’s not Brexit.
@Michael Lang: Brilliant.
@Michael Lang: Brexit means Brexit – —- but no one knows what Brexit actually is
The British people voted to leave the EU, albeit by a small margin. It has emerged that they were lied to and misled by being presented with false statements by unscrupulous politicians.
The ‘leaving’ part has proven to be not so easy, as GB can’t just walk out the door, without fulfilling their commitments. Surely any person, politician or otherwise, could have seen this and acted accordingly.
For now the only logical solution must be to hold another referendum to allow the British people to decide whether to accept the final negotiated position or not. I think that result could be very different to the last vote. That would be the ultimate Democratic thing to do.
@odonnellp: I have reported your comment. It is a sane, balanced and reasonable comment. Don’t let it happen again. There is no call for that kind of sensible comment.
Its naive to think there is freedom of democracy in Europe.
Citizens do not count.
Votes do not count.
Democracy is an illusion.
All the while the Red Herring 8th takes the spotlight when real issues are far more important in 2018 Ireland.
@Ron: another clown blaming Europe for a countries individual judgement. Go back to fb.
Democracy is dead.
@Danny Tagert: No it’s Not.
@Paul Furey: a few hundred unelected Lords can over-rule the democratic vote of 17.5 millon people and stop what was voted for. Democracy is dead, crushed by unelected tyrants.
@Danny Tagert: chuckling!
@Danny Tagert: Oh Danny the hard line Tory!
@John Maye: can any of you three clowns elaborate on why democracy is not dead after the unelected Lords scuppered the vote of the people?
@neilo: To be fair to him – the House of Lords is an archaic joke. No disputing that.
Not that this is anything new, though. The HoL has been an undemocratic check on democracy from the very beginning. We’re not witnessing the death of democracy, though, we’re seeing the flaws of a bad bicameral legislature being exposed once again.
@Danny Tagert: it was actually an internal Cabinet revolt which has forced May’s hand.
@Danny Tagert: The “Lords”, have not scuppered anything. All they can do ( and have done) is send the issue back to the House of Commons for them to reconsider. It is for the directly elected single-constituency in the HoC to exercise parliamentary sovereignty as regards the Executive’s proposals. Democracy is an ongoing process.
@Terry McClatchey: Been long since dead.
@Danny Tagert: Democracy is just an illusion to fool the people it never existed.
@Danny Tagert: long since dead.
@Danny Tagert: I have to laugh at the EU being criticised by the British because Commissioners are assigned by elected governments and then you look at the House of Lords.
The real question is whether or not the UK’s current arrangements represent a functioning democracy by modern, representative European standards.
I think the case against is very strong and that is unfortunate for ordinary British people.
That would be some turn around.
@Deborah Behan: They must be getting dizzy there’s been so many. Aroogant blind fools, the lot of them.
This is old news. Downing Street issued a statement last night reaffirming they will not be staying in the customs union.
Is it the EU that are afraid of the UK leaving the customs union, successfully negotiating other trade agreements, together with a form of trade agreement with Brussels to satisfy EU industries ?
Is the EU using the “border” issue to disrupt the UK leaving the customs union ?
She knows full well remaining in the CU will bring down the government.
@wattsed: the EU afraid of the UK leaving? That’s clearly not true.
@Dave Thomas: I suspect you may be wrong. A successful UK outside the increasingly political micro managing of Brussels may just lead to the earlier break up of the EU if there is no meaningful change from within.
Politically, it’s become increasingly centrally controlled, similar to the old Soviet Union.
This was refuted by number 10 before this article was published.
How far behind the news cycle are you?
Anyway the Duchess of Cambridge has gone into Labour. That’s far more interesting news for this morning.
@Damocles:
Oh Damocles i foresee you crying into your cornflakes. We in Dublin will have a say over the rules of the customs union and you Brits can follow along…that ok?
In other words brexit is a farce
Now it is clear that the lies lies that people were told before the vote were lies
They made promises they couldn’t have ever kept.
It’s very simple ‘ the UK really want to be part of the EU but don’t want the immigrants to go with it
@Mark Walsh:
Wrong.
The British people want to be governed by the govt that they vote for, not Brussels.
What a ridiculous situation this whole thing is… Why Oh why did did Britian bring this situation on themselves and drag us in to their problems…
Nigel Garage and his accomplices sold nieve voters a total lie and now, stubborn ,
@Chris Kiely: voters who must regret this, just won’t accept the absolutely ridiculous situation they have put themselves in and change it…
When you really think about the situation they are in and all the problems it’s causing, for what, something Nigel Garage and his crue sold them based on lies and misinformation…
@Chris Kiely: because David Cameron wanted his ego stroked and it backfired spectacularly. The English public voted for leave because they believe the EU is to blame for their problems as thats the nonsence they have been fed by their government.
Seems there was a bit of premature celebration by the usual Eurofans here!
Give back the 6 county’s illegally ocupied by tyrant dictator’s,,a united Ireland better than any border,,,get British politics out of Ireland win,,win situation.
The headline is inaccurate. This is all speculation and today May ruled out staying in the Customs Union and warned of a confidence vote over the issue.
Complicate or not. If GB leaves the customs union, there will be a hard border, the question os where. In the Irish sea, the DUP is against it. Between North and South, the republic don’t want. But the EC need a border, and to avoid a border in Ireland, there s only one place left, between Ireland, GB and the Continent or the DUP must change his mind and stay in the customs union.
have your say