The Minister of Ecological Transition Christophe Béchu defended on Friday new aid to consumers of fossil fuels, this time for the French who heat themselves with fuel oil, justifying a “deviation” from the climate trajectory in order to avoid “social reefs” .
Fossil fuels are primarily responsible for global warming, so the sooner we get out of it the better off we are, the minister said on RTL. But we can sometimes show subtlety of nuances and, the priority this year, as it was judged, in particular by Parliament where the political forces are diverse, is to consider that the support for purchasing power deserves to be a little behind on certain climatic elements.
The minister was questioned about aid voted by Parliament this summer, of up to 200 euros and which will be paid from November to around half of the French people who heat themselves with fuel oil, i.e. 1.4 million people, according to the Minister of Public Accounts Gabriel Attal Thursday.
I plead that from the moment we have a clear course, we can make a few deviations, if we realize that we have social reefs, to avoid there also setting the French against each other, continued Mr. Bchu, provided that these one-off aids do not become counterproductive signals.
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Fuel aid was imposed by the opposition coalition. We are in the process of implementing it, by integrating the wood pellets of those who heat themselves with pellets in particular, because there has been an explosion in prices, he announced. According to him, if we only help those who use fossil fuels and do not give a helping hand to those who, with the same income levels, have already chosen modes that are more respectful of the environment, we sends a wrong signal into the wrong signal.
Mr. Bchu also stood up against daily environmental controversies, especially on private jets. If we look at things from the small end of the telescope, whether we take advantage of it to hunt for the rich or, on the contrary, to try to pit the French against each other, we are going against this climatic trajectory, castigated the minister, while calling for everyone to take their part.
Just because the next flat is burning with bigger flames doesn’t mean you don’t start putting out yours, he said.