Consultation on the establishment of a Just Transition Commission

Climate change is an unprecedented challenge for everyone, including Northern Ireland. In recent years, we have begun to see the very real impact of climate change, both locally and globally. From more frequent and more significant flooding events impacting local businesses and communities, to extreme heat contributing to wildfires causing damage to our wildlife and our countryside, as well as the increasingly evident biodiversity crisis as seen at Lough Neagh.

In February 2020 the Northern Ireland Assembly stood  together to declare a climate emergency. In June 2022, the Assembly passed the Climate Change Act (Northern Ireland) 2022 (the Act) which sets out the framework for tackling climate change and reducing emissions, including setting a target to deliver net zero emissions in Northern Ireland by 2050.

Since coming into office, I have started to deliver on each of the requirements of the Act. In May, I introduced legislation for climate change reporting for public bodies that will help public bodies take informed and timely climate action. I am engaging with my Executive colleagues now to set our carbon budgets and interim emissions reduction targets for 2030 and 2040 and hope to soon bring these before the Assembly.

I am also engaging with my Ministerial colleagues to expedite our Climate Action Plan development. Identifying policies and proposals for inclusion in the Climate Action Plan is a legal responsibility shared by all departments and the plan will include actions from across all of government.

The draft Climate Action Plan will need to be agreed by the Executive, prior to its publication for the required 16-week consultation. By publishing Northern Ireland’s first draft Climate Action Plan, I will be setting out our proposed pathway to meeting the first carbon budget. Meeting carbon budgets will require ambitious policies and proposals that can be operationalised at pace. This is a challenge for all sectors, both in the current fiscal context but also in terms of capacity, but it is one that I am determined we will deliver on. I believe that we can do this together, and that in taking positive climate action to reduce our emissions that we can start to take advantage of and deliver on the significant benefits not only environmentally, but socially and economically.

On delivering on our climate targets, it is essential that we do so in a way that is fair and just. This is a key requirement of the Act. A just transition is one which ensures that the transition to a net zero society is one where the costs and the benefits of decarbonisation and the removal of greenhouse gases from our atmosphere are shared equitably across the economy and across society, ensuring that no-one is left behind.