Some €1.5m of Midlands' Just Transition funding diverted for other uses

The Aontú leader, Peadar Tóibín, has highlighted a decision by the Department of the Environment last December to reallocate €1.5 million earmarked for the Just Transition scheme in the Midlands in order for it to be spent on "international climate change commitments" instead.

In a recent Dáil question, Deputy Tóibín asked Environment Minister Eamon Ryan for details of money that was "moved across budget lines" within his Department since the current Government was formed in 2020.

Among the details included in the response was a figure of €1.5 million in capital funding that was initially allocated for the Just Transition initiative but was moved on December 6 last to be used as "additional funding to support the climate finance activities of the United Nations Development Programme".

In a statement, Deputy Tóibín said he was outraged by the funding transfers, saying he would be questioning Minister Ryan about them in the Dáil in the near future.

"It is clear that the Green Party do not believe in a 'just transition'. They are hell bent on wagging their finger at rural Ireland and telling people what they can and cannot do," said Deputy Tóibín.

"What this proves, in my view, is that Minister doesn't care for positive action and would much rather persist in his anti-rural attitude, and punish ordinary hard working people in rural Ireland and point a finger of blame at them, all the while failing to spend on positive initiatives like retrofitting."

This newspaper contacted the Department of the Environment, Climate and Communications with questions about the reallocation of the Just Transition funding.

In response issued yesterday (Thursday), a Department spokesperson said budgetary adjustments were made "as and when the need arises," but that this "does not affect or impact overall funding and commitment to the just transition in the Midlands region."

The spokesperson said the Governement was "committed to a just transition" in the Midlands and that it had "dedicated a significant amount of funding to supporting workers, companies and communities affected by the closure of peat-fired power stations and the cessation of peat harvesting by Bord na Móna."

"The National Just Transition Fund continues to provide ongoing support to 56 local and community-led projects across the wider Midlands region," the spokesperson said.

The Department added that €29 million in funding would be available to the Midlands region in 2023, under the national and EU Just Transition funds, and that there would be another significant announcement this month about a funding commitment for the years ahead.

"The EU Just Transition Fund will be launched later this month and will target funding to the Midlands region, including east Galway, Kildare, Laois, Longford, north Tipperary, Offaly, Roscommon and Westmeath, to address the longer-term economic transition of the region arising from the end of commercial peat extraction and peat-fired power generation," the spokesperson said.