EAMON RYAN HAS said that he intends to lead the Green Party into the next General Election, telling The Journal that he is “absolutely focused” on the role.

In a wide-ranging interview with The Journal, Ryan said that he still has ambition and desire to lead his party and that he wants to deliver “profound change”.

“I’m absolutely focused,” Ryan said.

“I’m in politics for a reason. It’s to deliver a profound change that brings us back on a path, a more sustainable path that’s better for nature and better for us as people.”

“I’ve just as much ambition in that and desire to do it as I had when I started 30 years ago.”

He said that he got a sense of his desire to keep going after he read the most recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report, which detailed that current climate promises by countries’ will not be sufficient to prevent temperatures from rising by more than 1.5 degrees Celsius.

Ryan has led the Green Party for the last 12 years, taking over following the party’s electoral wipeout in 2011. He lost his own seat at the election, but regained it in 2016.

He led the party to its biggest ever share of Dáil seats in 2020, where the party returned 12 TDs and voted to enter Government with Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael.

Ryan narrowly retained the leadership of the party following an internal contest following the General Election, beating Martin by 994 votes to 946.

However, there has been some internal party issues in recent weeks, with Green Party TD Neasa Hourigan confirming that she intends to vote against the Government on a Sinn Féin motion to extend the eviction ban.

When asked if Green Party TDs voting against the Government put pressure on him, Ryan said that it was all part of leadership of a political party and that disagreement wasn’t always a bad thing.

“That’s what comes with leadership of a party. It’s not all nine to five and cutting ribbons and smashing bottles of champagne over big ships as they go down the quayside. 

“It’s managing the real life of political parties and political systems, which is based on sometimes disagreement and sometimes disagreement is not a bad thing.”

Carbon emissions

In recent weeks, there has been some criticism of Ryan for his St Patrick’s Day trip to China, particularly over the high carbon emissions generated by long haul flights to the country.

When asked by The Journal if he thought he was held to higher standards for his own carbon emissions, Ryan said that he is.

“Yeah, I live with that on an ongoing basis because I have been for a long time – 30 years – interested in this whole issue about climate and how we respond,” Ryan said.

“It is an issue, if you’re out, on the one, hand saying we all have to change and at the same time you’re on a plane, that is a difficulty.”

However, he said that naming and shaming people for their emissions and personal habits was not the way forward.

“That whole thing about blaming or pointing at individuals saying ‘you shouldn’t be taking that flight’, I just think that will lead us down the wrong path.”

Ryan said that a key part of his trip to China was around meeting with the Chinese Environment Minister, saying that it was important to have a relationship with people you would be negotiating with at climate conferences.

When asked why Ireland should be working to reduce emissions when countries like China were among the biggest emitters, Ryan said that China was currently leading in renewable energy output.

He did acknowledge that the country was still constructing additional coal plants and said that this could be addressed through diplomacy and that China would have to work on it “one way or another”.

At present, China relies primarily on coal for their electricity generation, with a report from the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air detailing how two coal-fired plants were signed off on each month in 2022.

This is despite promises from Chinese President Xi Jinping to begin to reduce coal use in the country from 2026.

However, Ryan said that the transition to renewable energy was an “opportunity for everyone to shine” and that he believed it was important to make Ireland green regardless of what China is doing.

“Regardless of what’s China’s doing, what I’d like to do is make Ireland green, because I think that’s good for Ireland, no matter what,

“That’s good for Ireland from a social way, economy way, local environment way.

“I think the ‘what if’ or the ‘ah but’ or the conditional thing of ‘I won’t do anything until someone else does something’ is not smart because this is a better system we’re going to move to, so why wouldn’t you want to do it as fast as we possibly can.”

Irish community

Ryan added that he saw the trip as a way to reconnect with the Irish community in China, saying that they had been particularly isolated in recent years due to the stringent Covid-19 lockdown in the country.

China only removed Covid restrictions last December, following nationwide protests against the country’s hardline approach to the virus.

Border restrictions were then loosened in January, with visitors from abroad no longer required to enter quarantine on arrival. However, a negative PCR test within 48 hours is still needed to enter the country.

“Just to recognise, part of what Paddy’s Day is you do connect with Irish communities and that community had been particularly isolated through the whole Covid period.

“I just thought, I had been in Washington last year and New York and I thought, ‘where would you go that is really useful?’

“Well I thought China was the best opportunity.”