Campaigners call for budget surplus to be used to reach nature and climate targets

The Environmental Pillar, the Sustainable Water Network (SWAN), Stop Climate Chaos, and Extinction Rebellion Ireland at a rally last month calling on all political leaders in Ireland to ensure that Ireland supports the Nature Restoration Law. File picture: Mark Stedman

A climate and nature restoration fund must be established from the expected surplus billions in State coffers in the coming years, environmental bodies have said.

As Europe's proposed Nature Restoration Law hangs in the balance amid political acrimony in Brussels, Ireland’s Environmental Pillar, made up of a range of groups, said the Government needs to "drastically increase spending on nature and secure climate funding for the coming decades".