Greens push to revive pollution tax proposal

Date: 11/01/1996

By Michael Mann

THE Green group in the European Parliament is launching a new campaign for the introduction of EU-wide environmental taxes, following the failure of plans introduced by the last Commission in 1992 to find favour with EU finance ministers.

In an attempt to breathe new life into CO2 tax proposals which were all but killed off at the Essen summit in December 1994, the Greens are demanding “not only a green tax on non-renewable energy (nuclear and fossil fuels)”, but on a whole range of pollutants - including waste, fuels emitting sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxides, and noise pollution.

The Greens take heart from the decision by a number of member states to go ahead with at least limited forms of green taxation, pointing particularly to the decisions taken by the Scandinavian and Benelux countries and “fierce political discussions in Austria and Germany”.

The Greens calculate that in Denmark and its Nordic neighbour Norway, 'green taxes' account for about 10&percent; of state revenue. Overall, they believe that the gradual introduction of a wide-ranging tax on carbon energy could result in a reduction in EU carbon dioxide emissions of up to 20&percent; by the year 2000.

This, they argue, would make a considerable contribution to the EU's undertaking to reduce emissions of so-called 'greenhouse gases'.

The group stresses its opposition to “using environmental taxes to diminish the state deficit”, fearing a backlash against the environmental lobby.

But while some Greens believe that revenue raised through energy taxes should allow reductions in taxes on labour, others feel that this would give member states a vested interest in keeping such taxes in place, defeating the whole point of such charges.

The Green group ascribes the failure of former Taxation Commissioner Christine Scrivener to push through her plans for a carbon tax to “the veto used by the Conservative government in the UK” to block agreement on the proposal. But it was clear that London had wide-ranging support from elsewhere in the Union, particularly Greece, Portugal and Ireland.

The debate will be taken up at a special conference being held in the Parliament today (11 January), the first of a series of such events planned by the group. Green MEPs hope that it will give a clear signal to the Commission as it prepares its communication on member states' use of green levies, due out in the spring.

Among the conference contributors will be Internal Market Commissioner Mario Monti and parliamentarians from several member states.

Zygmunt Tysziewicz, secretary-general of EU employers' federation UNICE, Willy Buschak from the European Trade Union Confederation and Ernst-Ulrich von Weizsäcker of the Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy will participate in a lengthy debate as the conference draws to a close.