Sinn Féin are increasingly “hostile” towards the environmental agenda, Green party leader Eamon Ryan has claimed. 

As Minister for the Environment, Mr Ryan has clashed with the party in recent months - most notably over the ban on the sale of commercial turf. 

While Mr Ryan said it was necessary in order to cut the number of deaths caused by air pollution, Sinn Féin President Mary Lou McDonald described it as “the wrong move at this time” and brought a motion before the Dáil to prevent the Government from proceeding with the ban. 

In August, the Government announced its intention to cut emissions from the agricultural sector by 25%; Ms McDonald, by contrast, recently said she “accepts” the target and declined to state whether her party would do anything differently. 

A farmer on a tractor cutting hay in June 2006. Picture by: Michael Grubka / Alamy Stock Photo

“I think in instances, increasingly, they seem to be hostile to the environmental agenda and I think they’re out of step with the Irish people on that,” Mr Ryan told journalists. 

“I think they’re out of step with what they’re going to have to do if they were in Government - because there isn’t an option on this. 

“And I think there’s a real question, when you see comments like that, ‘What are Sinn Féin about when it comes to this issue?’

“Because it seems to me, that is an outright hostility to this issue that speaks volumes.” 

Sinn Féin have been contacted for comment.

Main image: Eamon Ryan and Mary Lou McDonald.