Guarded welcome for olive branch to Greens

Budget 2008 opened with an olive branch for the Greens – the Minister for Finance promised no conflict between the environment and the economy.

And while the party only has two Cabinet seats, their influence appears to have stretched a little further around the table.

Brian Cowen’s tightrope act has seen the 'polluter pays' principle taken on board, car buyers have been urged to stop and think, while cuts in carbon emissions were merely suggested.

Environmentalists gave a guarded welcome.

Roger Garland, chairman of countryside group Keep Ireland Open and the country’s first Green TD, said: “There are signs of greener thinking getting in there alright.”

Friends of the Earth said it was a curtain raiser.

“[Today’s Budget] was a small step towards sustainability but we still need a giant leap,” FoE director Oisin Coughlan said.

“It’s a start, it’s a curtain raiser maybe, but we need to see the main act next year.”

Reforms welcomed by environmentalists included Vehicle Registration Tax which will be in seven bands – ranging from 14% to 36% of the vehicle’s value. The bands, to be introduced from July 1 next year, depend on emissions levels with the dirtier the car the costlier the tax.

Motor tax is increased, for the first time since 2003, by 11% for cars over 2.5L and 9% for under 2.5L.

But the infamous carbon tax plan once again appears to have been long-fingered.

Christopher Fettes, founder of the Ecology Party of Ireland in 1981 which later became the Green Party, said: “I think it certainly is much greener than if we had not been in there.

“I certainly don’t think that an ecologically organised country needs to be a miserable one but it depends what the money, and what comes from the economy, what that is being spent on.”

Mr Fettes, who has held fundamental green views for the last 30 years, urged Mr Cowen to tax fuel in a way to put people off driving and also address the need for water charges.

The Budget noted the plan to cut carbon emissions by 3% year on year. John Gormley, Minister for the Environment, will explain tomorrow how various measures will hit these demanding heights.

Mr Garland disputed the minister’s take on the relationship between the economy and the environment.

“I think that’s a bit facile. I think there’s always going to be a problem with the balance to be struck. It’s a little bit oversimplified,” Mr Garland said.

And he criticised the Government for not working to bring down the cost of wind farms and rather than having them on mountain tops to consider open lowland areas.

Even though Mr Cowen, with the Greens at his side, secured some praise for Budget 2008, environmentalists from the Tarawatch group, which opposes the M3 motorway near the Hill of Tara branded his financial plan highway robbery.

They accused Brian Cowen of bringing in green taxes with more money being spent on motorways.