Michael Clifford: Stormy weather of climate change must be faced by us all

Do our politicians have what it takes to steer us through all the sacrifices that we need to make to stave off a climate disaster? Mick Clifford thinks the onus will fall largely on voters to force politicians into action

As things stand, we have an ambitious target in this country that may now fall short of what is required to combat climate change. Photo: Sam Boal/Rollingnews.ie

We’ve been having plenty of weather this summer. Whether it’s been good or bad depends on your perspective. 

For instance, that dry spell for about 10 days at the end of last month was glorious as far as I’m concerned. I was down in south Kerry and when the sun shines on the Iveragh peninsula there is no better place to be (Fact!). The days were warm and long and the sea never as inviting. 

We ate outside and slept with the windows wide open and told ourselves this would never end. When it did, and the wind began to howl at night and it rained hammers and nails, we knew the Irish summer had finally arrived.

So it has been ever since. As I am writing this, the newsfeed on my phone has just pinged. “Strong winds batter Atlantic coast as weather warning issued by Met Eireann”. Same as it ever was. Or is it?

While on a break, I kept at bay the nagging voice that questioned the Mediterranean conditions. Climate change was banished from my thoughts in the name of lazy, hazy days, to be only considered at holiday’s end when reality beckoned.

On Monday last, reality landed like a comet with the publication of the latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The message was stark. The planet is burning and human activity is the arsonist. UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres described the report as a “code red for humanity”.

Ireland’s most senior scientist and IPCC member, Peter Thorne said, “the choices we make today will reverberate for millennia to come”. He described the potential rise in sea levels as “quite harrowing”.

“Can you imagine the implications for Galway and Cork? We would have to retreat from the great cities of Ireland,” he said.

As things stand, we have an ambitious target in this country that may now fall short of what is required.

The Climate Act which passed through the Oireachtas earlier this year commits to a reduction of 51% in emissions by 2030. Last year, when the economy effectively ground to a halt due to the pandemic, emissions in this country fell by around 5%.

At the very least a similar reduction will be required annually for the next nine years with the economy and society hopefully operating at full pelt. How we use electricity, avail of transport, heat our homes and even produce food will all have to undergo huge changes.

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Does our political system have the capacity to deal with what is required? If the challenge is to be met, leadership on a scale rarely seen heretofore will have to be displayed. Politicians are hotwired to promise that they can improve lives, provide better services, lower taxes, hike up the quality of life.

Climate change will require them to make decisions that will disrupt and be perceived in many quarters as reducing the quality of life as people know it. Communicating that these things will have to be done in order to stave off Armageddon at a date beyond the next election, or even the one after that, will not come naturally to politicians. 

Short-term pain for long-term gain is an alien concept to political instincts. How are they going to pull it off? The omens are not good. 

Carbon tax

Take one small vignette from this week. On Tuesday, Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe was asked on RTÉ Radio’s News At One how the Government will go about reducing carbon emissions. 

The Government, Donohoe said, had made “significant decisions on taxing carbon over the last few budgets.” Ok, and what else?

“Over the last two years as we have increased taxation on carbon we have reinvested all revenue back into activity that will reduce carbon,” he told Paul Cunningham.

Right, but is that it?

“You’re speaking to the minister who put up the price of carbon for the last two budgets.”

And on it went. Tax the living daylights out of carbon and we can, in macro terms, keep the show on the road, seems to be the message.

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Many for whom the minister’s party is a political home would like to see the traditional model of economic growth continue despite the looming emergency. It is highly debatable whether that is possible but Donohoe quite obviously isn’t willing to yet give up the ghost.

Serious leadership, driving transformative change right across the economy, will be needed to achieve the target and bring a large proportion of the population with them.

As of now, the only constituent element of government that appears up for the challenge is the Greens, and their position at cabinet is relatively small.

The opposition benches don’t elicit much confidence either.

Carbon taxes are no kind of panacea but they are widely accepted as being one of a number of basic tools vital to any attempt to reduce emissions.

Other options

Application needs to be nuanced and take account of the dangers of fuel poverty, as outlined in an ESRI report during the week.

Yet Sinn Féin insists it will not, in government, levy any extra tax in this area. The party does not believe in charging for water at a time when natural resources are growing more precious, nor a tax on property during a housing crisis.

The same approach will be taken to carbon, which raises a question as to whether or not they are serious about what’s ahead. As such, the chances of the Shinners exercising the leadership required are as remote as those applying to their political opponents.

In such a milieu there exists a strong case for some sort of an agreed framework not just on the overall target as per the Climate Act but on the specifics of how reductions will be achieved.

That would cut out the kind of hurly-burly that is the normal stuff of politics but an expensive sideshow during a time of emergency.

Whether the body politic would be ready for such an approach in the national – not to mind planetary – interest is a moot point.

In the absence of that, it’s largely up to the people. If the government of the day over the next decade is not willing to lead and innovate then voters need to apply pressure on the system to act fast in all our interests.

As individuals, everybody has personal responsibility to do their bit but that may now need to include engaging with the political system to an extent that will be alien to the vast majority. Let them know what you think about where we’re all going.

The decades-long holiday from addressing climate change, when it was effectively put on the never, never, is over.

Let’s see who is serious about facing into the stormy weather that lies ahead.