Policy Director and Sec Gen of the EEB will attend the Informal meeting of Environment and Climate Ministers in Dublin Castle this Thursday and Friday
As EU environment ministers head to Dublin for a two-day “informal meeting”, hosted by Minister Darragh O’Brien, Europe’s largest environmental network [1] has warned them to resist the pressure for short-term deregulation and focus on delivering long-term resilience and prosperity. The EEB, comprising 190 organisations with 30 million members across Europe, will be represented at the ministerial meeting by their Policy Director and Secretary General. Top of the public agenda for the meeting is the question of “Decarbonisation and Competitiveness” [2] .
Commenting, before leaving Brussels to travel to Ireland by train and ferry, EEB Policy Director, Faustine Bas-Defossez, said:
“Can we please stop pretending environmental rules are a burden on Europe’s economy? June’s heatwave alone killed around 14,000 people in Europe. Failing to implement EU environmental law already costs Europe an estimated €180 billion every year.
“The real burden is the cost of failing to deliver the European Green Deal. Environment ministers must defend this agenda tooth and nail. If a crisis with that human and economic toll is not our top priority, what is?
“Europe cannot build competitiveness, security or prosperity on collapsing ecosystems and escalating climate disruption. Tackling the triple ecological crisis cannot be treated as just another priority, it is what will allow Europe to tackle the rest of its challenges.
“The choice facing environment ministers in Ireland this week is simple: continue down the path of deregulation and delayed action, ignoring facts, science and citizens or put Europe back on track as a global leader in the transition to a resilient, fossil fuel-free and prosperous future. The costs of inaction are already being felt across the continent.”
As the Irish Presidency began, the European Environmental Bureau (EBB), issued “10 Green Tests” in a memo to the Irish government [3].
The EEB is calling on the Irish Presidency to have the political courage and leadership to:
- ensure that “simplification” leads to better implementation, not deregulation;
- secure an ambitious long-term EU budget that invests in climate resilience, nature restoration and pollution prevention, including continued dedicated funding for the LIFE programme;
- safeguard science-based policymaking, democratic accountability and meaningful civil society participation;
- resist attempts to weaken cornerstone environmental legislation, including on biodiversity and water;
- strengthen implementation and enforcement of existing environmental law across the European Union.
Polling carried out by Ireland Thinks before the Presidency began found that the Irish public strongly supports European environmental law [4]. In fact 39% of people say the Government should use Ireland’s EU Presidency to strengthen EU environmental protections, with another 40% saying the Irish Presidency should work to uphold existing environmental protections. Only 12% of people say EU environmental protections should be weakened.
Commenting, EU Policy Advisor to the Irish Environmental Network, Oisín Coghlan said:
“Europe is never going to be competitive by depending on expensive, imported fossil fuels from unreliable international suppliers to the east or the west.
“Europe’s future autonomy, prosperity and sustainability is best served by a fast, fair and funded transition away from fossil fuels, underpinned by strong, predictable protections for the environment we all depend on.”
ENDS
Notes to the editor:
- The European Environmental Bureau (EEB) is Europe’s largest network of environmental citizens’ organisations with over 190 member organisations in 42 countries, representing some 30 million individual members and supporters.
- All the official details for the the meeting are available here on the Presiency website:
https://irish-presidency.consilium.europa.eu/en/events/informal-meeting-of-environment-and-climate-ministers-envi/ - The EEB memo to the Irish Presidency with the 10 Green Tests can be downloaded here: https://eeb.org/en/library/memorandum-to-the-irish-presidency-of-the-council-of-the-eu/
Press release here: https://eeb.org/en/from-heatwaves-to-deregulation-the-irish-presidency-must-put-europe-back-on-track/
- The Ireland Thinks polling was carried out 1-3 June with a sample size of 1,003 and a margin of error on +/- 3.1%. It was commissioned by the Irish Environmental Network. The full Ireland Thinks report is online here: https://bit.ly/IEN-EUpollingJun26
