Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 20 November 2018
189. Deputy Thomas Pringle asked the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform if he will devise and use a carbon budget methodology to ensure that Government spending and tax policies are in line with the required reductions in greenhouse gasses in order to meet the national transition objective and EU climate and energy targets for 2030. [48148/18]
View answerMy Department’s role is to deliver well-managed and well-targeted public spending. When it comes to climate change that means ensuring that Ireland’s climate transition is achieved at the lowest possible cost and that it is done so in a manner which is equitable.
A Carbon Budget places a legal restriction on the amount of greenhouse gas a country or sector can produce in a given time period. The development of specific climate action policies, such as the potential introduction of carbon budget methodologies, is a matter for the Minister for Communications, Climate Action and the Environment in the first instance. However, a sustained whole of Government approach will be required to enable Ireland’s transition to a low carbon, climate resilient and environmentally sustainable economy by 2050. In this context, the National Mitigation Plan and Minister Bruton’s forthcoming multi-annual, all-of-government plan for climate action represent important steps towards mainstreaming the climate change agenda into the policy formulation and decision making processes across all of Government.
I am, together with my Department, committed to assisting in this transition. My Department is currently undertaking a number of actions in order to help mainstream the climate change agenda into policy formulation and decision making processes across all of Government. For example, my Department is currently reviewing the Public Spending Code to ensure that all Government investment decisions will incorporate an appropriate assessment of the climate consequences of those decisions. I recently accepted an invitation from the OECD to join the Paris Collaborative on Green Budgeting. Participation in the Collaborative will help us to integrate environmental and climate outcome based reporting into our annual budgetary processes. This will be an iterative process but, as a first step, this year’s Revised Estimates Volume (REV) will include a table on climate related expenditure in a separate section of that report.
Finally, taxation policy also has an important role in supporting climate change policy. In this regard, there are already several established tax measures which support the reduction in national carbon emissions, in particular the carbon tax, the CO2 based Vehicle Registration Tax, the CO2 based motor tax, tax incentives which incentivise the uptake of electric and hybrid electric vehicles, and an Accelerated Capital Allowances Scheme which incentivises the uptake of cleaner energy technologies.
It is my intention that the current suite of environmental taxes continue to play an important role in supporting climate change policy.
