Driving Meaningful Change: Speech by Minister Catherine Martin at the Dublin Climate Summit

Check against delivery

Dia daoibh, a dhaoine uaisle, tá an-áthas orm labhairt libh inniu faoi thopaic atá ar cheann de na fadhbanna is práinní dúinne go léir mar shaoránaigh.

“A reporter is always concerned with tomorrow. There’s nothing tangible of yesterday.”

These are the words of Edward Murrow, a former American broadcast journalist and war correspondent, who first gained prominence during World War II.

It could be argued that we now face our own war, the fight to save the planet, the environment, our air, our crops and waters.

And as any seasoned journalist, editor or indeed war reporter will likely confess, tomorrow’s news is indeed the news. And right now climate danger is facing us head on, like never before on a daily basis, as a story.

Climate change is the greatest challenge confronting both this generation and future generations. We cannot escape or deny that fact. The latest report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, finalised in February of this year, shows us that the impacts of climate change are already being felt around the globe: on water scarcity and food production, on health and wellbeing, on cities, towns and infrastructure, and on whole ecosystems.

As the global average temperature rises, these effects will only become more extreme. As we are witnessing with the heatwave currently afflicting Pakistan and India, climate change is already impacting the most vulnerable areas of the globe. And the threats posed for islands like Fiji or the violent fire storms in Australia. The impacts are there.

And, despite our relativly strong economic standing and temperate climate, Ireland is not immune to these risks, nor can we afford to avert our gaze from the damage that is occurring elsewhere. Climate change will impact every citizen, every household, and business in the State and across our planet. The conversations we are having today will be important in informing the choices of businesses and citizens for the future.

That is why we as a government have not only committed to carbon neutrality no later than 2050, but have set out a goal to achieve a 51% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by the end of this decade. The Climate Action and Low Carbon Development (Amendment) Act 2021 has placed these targets on a legislative footing and the Climate Action Plan 2021 provides the means by which we will organise and co-ordinate our efforts to achieve the targets. Achievement of our climate ambitions will depend on how we tackle the issue together as a society. As the Climate Action Plan makes clear, we all need to change how we work, how we heat our homes, how we travel, how we produce, consume and store and use energy, how we consume goods and services, and how we manage our waste. But it is also about now how governments govern, how societies do business or parliaments legislate too.

The government is also committed to a Just Transition which acknowledges that some sectors will be more impacted than others. We will need to help people with the costs of the climate transition and to ensure no one is left behind.

We know we must act, and by acting now we can build a cleaner, fairer and more sustainable economy and society.

As Minister for Media, I am acutely conscious of the role the media can play in addressing climate change and influencing public opinion.

Today, we receive news content through a vast array of different sources, each with their own idiosyncrasies and agendas. We rely on reputable news sources to deliver the news on the basis of fact and a commitment to the pursuit of the truth.

The government does not intervene in the editorial independence. The principles of the freedom of the press and media freedom are firmly embedded in our Constitution, the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, and the European Convention on Human Rights.

The role of the government is to foster a media landscape that supports the plurality of the media, to ensure that journalists can perform their role as a watchdog, whether of the State or other powerful interests.

So a very particular public trust has been placed in the news media to communicate issues that matter accurately to the public.

A well-informed public is vital to the functioning of our democracy and fundamental to our self-governing society. A widespread understanding of the causes and effects of climate change is ultimately a pre-condition to taking action, as individuals and as nations.

Given the sheer scale of the impact of climate change on all of our lives, there is a very special responsibility on the news media to communicate accurate, informative and trustworthy information about climate change to the public.

It would be remiss of me not to also point out that accurate coverage will only be truly effective if sufficient resources and prominence are devoted to the coverage of climate change and that, where appropriate, the link between climate change and a news story is clearly signalled. And we thankfully are seeing, hearing and reading much more of this in our own media.

The work of the news media is also crucial to combatting climate change disinformation and denial and to debunking conspiracy theories. We witnessed the danger that conspiracy theories regarding COVID-19 could pose to public health during the recent pandemic.

The danger of climate denialism is more insidious and difficult to address, as the effects of climate inaction are years, rather than days, in the future. Today, with the global average temperature at 1 degree celsius above pre-industrial levels, we are dealing with the failure to take action over the past 30 years. If we fail to stabilise the global average temperature at 1.5 degrees celsius above pre-industrial levels, it will be because of actions that we failed to take now.

The Irish news media is rising to the challange of reporting on climate change. There is now a vibrant public debate on how best we can, together as a society, mitigate the climate crisis and adapt while also protecting the most vulnerable. It is a debate that now influences all areas of policy, from the optimal design of our energy system to the role of the tax system. But of course, more can, should and will be done.

There is also a role for Government in informing citizens through the promotion of climate literacy.

As part of the Climate Action Plan 2021, the government committed to supporting the development of media content which raises awareness of climate change, and promotes action and behavioural change to combat it. As such, we have recently allocated €5 million to the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland’s Sound and Vision scheme, for a new funding round to support the development of climate focused content and programming. This is a part of a wider stream of funding I announced which will also support TV and radio programming involving live music as well as the Irish language.

As Minister I am proud to have fulfilled this Climate Action Plan 2021 commitment. Sound and Vision funding will create programming that improves climate literacy and promotes climate change mitigation. This Sound and Vision programming, whether that is through documentaries, factual, lifestyle, or drama will show people what is happening to our climate and how to mitigate and adapt to it.

As with all sectors of the economy, the media sector must also take action to rapidly reduce greenhouse gas emissions associated with its activities as part of the pathway to net zero emissions. In this context, the launch of the Broadcasting Sustainability Network and the accompanying roadmap by the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland in 2020 was a significant step in the right direction for the Irish broadcasting sector.

The Network is a voluntary sector-wide sustainability group of Irish broadcasters and representatives of their supply chains. It aims to foster best practice and to provide the support to make the Irish broadcasting sector a sustainability leader that uses its collective voice to create a greener, more inclusive, more resilient future for all.

The broadcasting sector has a unique role to play in contributing to the UN Sustainability Development Goals and shaping a sustainable future. Through their content and programming, broadcasters have the power to inform and influence public attitudes and behaviours on a mass scale. Just look at the power and influence David Attenborough has had here. The sector can be a force for good in what will be a pivotal decade for environmental, social and economic change, both in Ireland and across the world.

Screen Ireland, the national agency for the Irish film, television and animation industry, recently published their Sustainability Plan 2022. The most striking target set out in the Plan is Screen Ireland’s aim to be net zero carbon across their own operations by 2025. Among the ways in which they will be tackling the issue, from this year on, all Screen Ireland funded productions are to use a Carbon Calculator to track and measure the carbon impact of their production, with a view to implementing carbon saving actions.

As part of the Climate Action Plan 2021, the government has set a target of implementing green sustainable certification criteria in the audio-visual sector as a requirement for productions supported through future funding schemes. In turn, all productions currently in receipt of Section 481 funding will have to report on the production’s efforts to reduce their carbon footprint and, when submitting skills development plans, outline details of any environmentally sustainable initiatives undertaken on their production to Screen Ireland.

This is just a snapshot of the progress being made in the media sector towards sustainability in the industry.

To bring us back to today’s event, I must acknowledge that occasions such as this are an important piece of the puzzle, and an ideal space to drive the climate change narrative in the right direction. Fostering a collective sense of shared purpose will only serve to help us reach our climate change goals.

As Minister I will continue to focus my efforts on how best my department can support the media sector to deliver effective change communication.

Turning my attention to our tourism sector, sustainability is a key issue there now. For background, I probably don’t need to tell you how important this sector is. In pure economic terms, the sector as a whole contributed over €9 billion to the economy in 2019 and supported nearly 260,000 jobs.

Tourism has proven to be a vital industry that sustains communities and drives regional development in a manner that most other industries struggle to deliver. Apart from its economic value, tourism also plays an important role in promoting Ireland’s image abroad, generating a positive impression of Irish people, our landscape and culture for our visitors.

And so, late last year I brought an Interim Action Plan to Government, developed by the Sustainable Tourism Working Group, identifying a suite of actions that will promote sustainable tourism practices out to 2023.

As committed to in the action plan, Fáilte Ireland have made significant progress establishing a framework for developing a comprehensive carbon footprint of Irish tourism and implementing sector-specific benchmarks. We are close to being able to provide a benchmark CO2 value for Irish tourism which will support evidenced-based decision making for effective reduction of the tourism carbon footprint. The added understanding of our sectors carbon footprint will also allow for more effective sustainable policy development as we set out what type of tourism sector we want in the years ahead.

Such actions would review energy use and providers, actions to decrease food waste, food sourcing (local rather than from other countries), what materials are being used, for example: recyclable cups, water usage and so on.

For the visitor, the calculator/toolkit will allow them to make better decisions regarding their stay, for example: modes of sustainable transport, use of recyclable materials, coffee cups, visiting businesses that have a track record of reducing carbon footprint.

The author Henry Millar said “One’s destination is never a place, but rather a new way of looking at things”. With that in mind and as per our Programme for Government commitments, officials in my department have commenced the development of a new National Tourism Policy. This Sustainable Tourism Policy will also mainstream environmental, social and economic sustainability, and will act to help tourism to play its part in contributing to the achievement of Ireland’s climate targets.

The development of this new policy will involve consultation. And we will be seeking the views of all stakeholders on how the tourism sector can contribute to meeting national and international policy commitments on climate change and national emissions reduction requirements.

In Arts and Culture, the Creative Ireland Programme is supporting 15 Creative Climate Action projects across Ireland that promote climate-related behavioural change through cultural and creative projects. The projects funded under the Creative Climate Action Fund provide insight, innovative ideas, and scalable solutions to the challenges of climate change and will seek to make tangible what ‘carbon footprints’ and ‘climate action’ really mean for individuals and communities, providing an important contribution to citizen engagement.

Last year, together with Minster Eamon Ryan, I launched that Creative Climate Action fund. This was the first explicit link between national climate and cultural policy within the EU.

Projects under it include dairy farmers in west Kerry on a journey to reduce their energy and fertiliser use working with an artist who is a farmer to document the change; dramatic light installations at coastal locations around the country showing rising sea levels; Bohemian Football club and its local supporters working with artists to understand their environmental impact.

The Greening Arts Centres initiative, led by the Arts Council, is also providing sustainability and capacity building support to Arts centres to reduce their carbon footprint and lead by example, as key drivers of community engagement across the country.

I have already flagged that Screen Ireland are leading the charge on being a responsible actor with a new sustainability plan.

We will also build on the success of the screen industry in recent years where a number of Irish productions, notably TG4’s Ros na Rún and RTÉ’s Cláracha Gaeilge, have been certified as sustainable productions.

Elsewhere, Sport Ireland and Fáilte Ireland are supporting Leave No Trace, which is an Outdoor Ethics Education Programme designed to promote and inspire responsible outdoor recreation through education, research and partnerships which will help to improving our outdoor recreation facilities and provide new opportunities for people to connect with nature.

A new Major Events Policy is also currently out for public consultation and will promote sustainable events practices, which will also feed into my department’s work on greening other sports, cultural and community events.

As said already, ensuring a Just Transition is a priority. The implementation of the Gaeltacht Ghlas strategy will see Údarás na Gaeltachta lead the way in sustainable regional development, by transitioning to renewable energy across its commercial properties.

Údarás na Gaeltachta, as the enterprise development agency for Gaeltacht regions, is also playing an important role in decarbonisation of enterprise in Gaeltacht regions, by greening its own infrastructure and promoting sustainable practices within its client companies.

To all of team involved in organising today’s climate summit, let me start by offering my warmest congratulations on what is a timely, stimulating, and ultimately an exceptionally well run event. Organising an event of this scale takes vision and hard work. It is a great achievement.

To echo the sentiments of my government colleagues, the Taoiseach Micheál Martin, and Minister for Finance, Paschal Donohoe, who spoke earlier in the day’s proceedings, we are, as a government, striving to act quickly and effectively to achieve the targets set out in the Climate Action Plan and those we have collectively agreed as a Member State of the European Union.

The government cannot, of course, drive climate action on its own. We need a collective effort from all areas of industry to take action and to shape and positively influence public opinion so that we can drive meaningful change.

My thanks also to all of you for attending today’s summit. I hope that you find the afternoon session informative and thought-provoking.

The climate crisis is a monumental challenge but it is one that we, if we are equipped with the necessary skills, knowledge and resolve, can overcome together.

Go raibh maith agaibh as ucht bhur gcuid ama agus bainigí taitneamh as an gcuid eile den seisiún inniu.