Sinn Féin climate spokespersons Darren O’Rourke TD and Senator Lynn Boylan say the latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is a stark warning and urgent call to action for governments across the globe and in Ireland.

Spokesperson on Climate Action, Communications Networks and Transport, Darren O’Rourke TD, said: 

“The report is a stark warning. It is an urgent call to action.  

“In our recent contribution to the Climate Action Bill debate, Sinn Féin outlined the need for public involvement to be at the heart of the climate change effort. We need to bring all communities along this journey to a decarbonised future. 

“The government’s punitive approach of carbon taxes and fuel and electricity price hikes will simply not work. It is clear from today’s report that an unprecedented collaborative and collective effort will be needed to address the increasing climate emergency.

“The latest IPCC report represents the latest and most advanced scientific assessment of climate change and the connection between human activity and global warming. 

“The report concludes that it is unequivocal that human influence has warmed the atmosphere, ocean and land and that, as a result, human-induced climate change is widespread, rapid and intensifying.

“It further concludes that the scale of recent changes across the climate system are unprecedented over many centuries to many thousands of years and that global warming of 1.5°C and 2°C will be exceeded during the 21st century unless deep reductions in carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions occur in the coming decades.”

Spokesperson on Climate Justice, Senator Lynn Boylan, added:

“We cannot address the issues outlined in this report without systemic change that is state-led. Ireland and our health system was not prepared for the pandemic. We have to learn from that.  

“We need to prepare both for the consequences of climate change that are now happening while also taking the measures needed to cut emissions and protect our environment and biodiversity.   

“Addressing the crisis of climate breakdown must be done in a way which tackles the large corporate polluters, uses public investment to facilitate changes in how we all live and behave and does not punish ordinary people through punitive charges which play no role in changing behaviour.  

“It is very clear that we need radical action to tackle climate change. Governments must be free to take the regulatory and public policies required to rapidly bring down emissions, provide public transport and shift to renewable energy.

“That means banning the importation of fracked gas which is releasing huge volumes of methane and destroying local communities.  The Irish government needs to be able to ban fuels like LNG without the fear of legal action from fossil fuel companies.  

“Minister Eamon Ryan should join his French and Spanish counterparts and demand that the EU leave the Energy Charter Treaty.  A treaty that facilitates energy companies to sue governments for making policy changes has no place in a Paris compliant future.”