Elaine Loughlin: How can Sinn Féin duck the world's biggest challenge?

Party must indicate how it will tackle climate change and reduce carbon emissions, writes Elaine Loughlin 

Asking the farmers to cut the number of their herd is not an easy message but Sinn Féin cannot deny that tough decisions have to be made. Picture: Larry Cummins

How can the most popular party in the country think it's acceptable to not hold a position on the greatest challenge facing our planet?

Sinn Féin, which has soared well beyond the two other main political parties in the polls, expects the electorate to blindly vote for its candidates in the next general election without giving any indication as to how it would reduce carbon emissions.

Asking farmers to potentially cut the number of cows they have or change how they use their land is not an easy message to deliver.

It's exactly why Green Party leader Eamon Ryan and Agriculture Minister Charlie McConalogue have been grappling to reach an exact carbon emission figure for agriculture over recent weeks.

Avoiding the issue

Sinn Féin's approach has been to avoid the climate change issue completely by placing the blame on Government departments for not sharing details of a report drawn up by the McKinsey consultancy firm.

Considering Sinn Féin hasn't published a policy document on climate since November 2019, it shouldn't be that surprising that the party is now asking to borrow the Government's homework.

To put this in context, the party has published 10 heath-related policy documents and seven policy papers on housing in the intervening period.

Sinn Féin spokesperson on Climate, Darren O’Rourke, admits that agriculture must pull its weight, like other sectors but the party is short on specifics. Picture: Gareth Chaney/Collins

Others in the opposition, however, have managed to come up with a position without the information Sinn Féin claims is necessary to form a view.

In recent days, PBP Solidarity TD Bríd Smith has said climate change is "the biggest challenge that the globe is facing" and "reducing emissions by 30% in agriculture is the law".

"It has to be met because the herd has increased by 500,000 to 600,000 in 10 years and it is totally unsustainable," she said.

This has been echoed by Social Democrats climate spokesperson Jennifer Whitmore who said the need for an agricultural emissions cut of 30% by 2030 is “blindingly obvious".

Criticism, but no solutions

But to Sinn Féin what is obvious is that the current coalition is failing, providing solutions is far less clear cut.

"Agriculture must pull its weight, just like every other sector. The targets, they must be fair, they must be ambitious, but they must be achievable," Sinn Féin climate spokesperson Darren O'Rourke said.

"What that means in terms of percentages, what that means in terms of the transformational change that's going to happen across every sector, that needs to happen across every sector, we do not have the detail, line by line, percentage by percentage, and we're not going to pick a finger out of the air."

He added: "We are going to reserve our position in relation to the sectoral emission ceilings until we see the information that we have sought and that has been committed to being published.

"But what we will continue to do is criticise Government for the failure of the policies that they've put together to achieve those targets."