Climate action plan for Tipperary needs to bring communities on board
Tipperary County Council officials charged with the responsibility of framing a Local Climate Action Plan have been told of the need to bring communities with them in the process.
Discussion of a Local Climate Action Plan at the July meeting of Tipperary County Council took place and a workshop for elected members was arranged for July 26.
It will go out to public consultation between July and October of this year and the 2024-2029 Climate Action Plan has to be adopted by the council by February 2024. After Claire Lee,Climate action co-ordinator, had outlined the purpose of the plan, Cllr David Dunne said it was an ambitious plan but he felt there was a need for the council to bring communities with them.
Cllr Dunne said that a lot of people in Tipperary would not qualify for the retro fitting and other grants that are available. He said that if the council was to meet whatever targets that would be set out in the final plan, they had to bring people on board.
Cllr Dunne said that there was a lot of talk of making such a plan feasible for business, but he insisted it had to be feasible for the public as well. He said electric cars were very expensive and a lot of people did not have the money to buy solar panels for their houses. Cllr Andy Moloney said the plan was good but did not go strong enough. “This needs to happen fast. I don’t think we will meet our targets by 2030,” said Cllr Moloney.
Cllr Annemarie Ryan said unless something dramatic was done to tackle climate change the next generations would have to live with the consequences. The Tipperary Town councillor said the plan was a good one but it would require proper funding from the Government and from Europe. Climate crisis, she said, affected the poorest in society as people living in poor houses paid bigger heating bills. She called on the council to do an audit of what housing stock needed to be retro fit.
Cllr Ryan said the length of time it took for people to apply for such schemes needed to be looked at. Cllr Ryan said that people find themselves going through a process that can last for between a year and eighteen months. That process needed to be speeded up, she insisted.
Cllr Marie Murphy said such a plan would not succeed without the necessary resources. Cllr Siobhán Ambrose said there was a long road to go for the plan to be finalised. She said there had to be a lot of engagement with the various communities concerned over the coming months. “It is very important that we encourage engagement on this issue,” she said.