Call for Irish workplace parking levy

The head of Ireland’s Climate Change Advisory Council has called on the Irish government to introduce a levy on workers who get free parking in towns and cities.

Marie Donnelly told the Oireachtas Transport Committee there is a provision in the 2008 Finance Bill under section 18(b) to calculate free parking as an additional benefit. Donnelly pointed out legislation is already in place to achieve this. She said sufficient measures have not been identified to achieve Ireland’s target of a 50% reduction in transport emissions from 2018 levels by 2030.

Donnelly said what is an ambitious target will require an early and fundamental shift in the Irish transport system. “There needs to be some pro rata for the privilege of having free parking,” she said. “Free parking is worth on average

€20 per day and that’s worth around €5,000 per year. We’re not saying ‘take the car away from people’, but if they are getting €5,000 a year of parking, it’s not an outrageous suggestion to say they should pay a levy and that funding should be used to further invest in alternative options that are available. It’s already on the statute books here in Ireland it was just never implemented.”

Donnelly criticised the time it takes for planning decisions to be made. She said: “Ireland’s planning system needs to be sufficiently resourced to be able to adjudicate and act on the rollout of public transport projects. One area of concern for the Climate Change Advisory Council is the speed at which the planning system operates and the fact that this is a delay factor in the roll-out of new public transport projects.”