False politics of fear and division pits the Greens against farmers

We have delivered more than any other small party in four years of Government

YESTERDAY we had our Green Party Convention in the RDS. We have 112 talented candidates who will run for the party in the local elections right across the country this June. They are on the doors. They are listening to people. They are already working hard to make a real difference to people’s lives and livelihoods. And they will do more. Because the Greens don’t do auction politics. We do action politics.

We’ve been in Government for the past four years and in that time we have delivered more than any other small party in the history of this State. Perhaps nobody put it better than Michael Healy Rae TD when he said last year that: ‘The Greens are doing exactly what they said they would. They’re even doing more than what they said they’d do.’

We’ve been at the forefront of the cost of living supports over the past two years, slashing public transport costs for the first time in 75 years, introducing the Leap Card throughout the country so that people everywhere can get even further travel discounts. We also spearheaded the energy credits that every household received to help offset some of the energy cost shocks caused by Mr Putin’s illegal war on Ukraine.

Every week 1,000 more households are waking up in warmer homes with lower fuel bills thanks to the retrofitting grants the Greens introduced in Government. More than half of the retrofitting budget is targeted specifically at providing totally free retrofits for low-income or energy-risk homes.

We got rid of planning permission and abolished VAT on solar panels and now they are popping up on 100 new homes every day, allowing people to generate their own clean energy and halving their electricity bills. Good for the planet and good for the pocket.

My colleague Roderic O’Gorman is the first Children’s Minister to halve the cost of childcare for hard-pressed young families.

We are the first political party in a century to turn the neglect of rural transport around. In rural Ireland, we are opening a new bus route every week. I was at Colbert Station in Limerick last week. There were packed buses heading to Hospital, Bruff and Mitchelstown. A massive 308million passengers chose public transport last year, up nearly 25% on the previous year. More than 3 million people took Local Link services. Since we came into Government, passenger numbers on these routes have gone up by over 300% on average. In many places it’s multiples of this. In Kerry, it’s 1,700% and in Galway it’s 1,600%.

We’re not just transforming connectivity on the ground, we’re doing it digitally too. Since Ossian Smyth took charge of the National Broadband Plan, it has been rolling out at speed. Within the next three years, every home in rural Ireland will have access to gigabit broadband. During Covid, a lot of people returned to their hometowns to work. Roderic

O’Gorman introduced a new law giving workers the right to request remote working and we have created a network of remote working hubs across the country, breathing new life and business into rural towns and villages.

I think this progress is unstoppable because Irish people like it. Irish people get climate and understand the serious threat that it poses.

A national survey carried out by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) tells us that 85% of Irish people take climate seriously. Only a tiny proportion, maybe 4 to 5%, are climate deniers.

But they are very busy, disproportionately sowing an alternative politics based on fear and division, mostly online. This new politics seems to combine a fear of migrants with a denial of climate change.

It does not realise that climate change will be the greatest driver of migration as this century progresses. It does not speak to the traditional values of respect, decency and humanity that I grew up with and that I see going around the country.

It is this type of politics that likes to pit the Greens against farmers. Nothing could be further from the truth. I have said again and again that farmers are the frontline heroes in the climate challenge.

But respect won’t put money in the bank. We have to reward farmers and farm families properly for their work, their expertise and their produce. We also have to provide viable, alternative income streams so that farmers and rural communities benefit financially and socially from adopting the nature-based solutions that will protect us all.

We are living in perilous times. War has returned to Europe. Gaza has seen untold suffering. Democracy is being destabilised throughout the world. These realities are all the more tragic because they are diverting us from the existential threat of climate change.

Each of the last ten months have been the warmest in recorded history. In Ireland, that has meant endless rain. Our fields are sodden. Our waterways are tipping over. Our food security is threatened.

It doesn’t have to be this way. We can succumb to a climate of populism and protectionism or we can turn to a climate of hope.

I have seen over 30 years in public life that we can both protect the environment and maintain a strong economy, while at the same time lowering bills, improving our quality of life and ensuring a secure future for our children and their children. We can help the world by making our own homes and communities better. Let’s keep going green.