He also defends limiting private jet flights and deploying night rail connections
Sumar has claimed as a measure against climate change the suppression of domestic flights when there is an alternative rail transport, which would mean emulating the strategy deployed in France and eliminating, for example, the ‘air bridge’ between Madrid and Barcelona.
This was stated at a press conference in Cádiz by the candidacy’s spokesman, Ernest Urtasun, who also defends the development of night train journeys as a transport alternative, the regulation and limitation of private jet flights.
Urtasun has explained that Sumar is proposing a series of measures in the face of the “climate emergency” that the country is experiencing and that translates into the heat wave that the country is suffering these days, where an essential aspect is to limit polluting emissions from the transport sector that represents 30% of the total.
And along these lines, he has advocated for the prohibition of air travel for those connections where there is a train route of less than three hours, which in the case of Spain would not be limited only to the Madrid-Barcelona route but would also impact others. For example, from the candidacy they indicate that it would also have an impact on the routes between the capital with Malaga and Seville, which have the high-speed train alternative.
During his appearance, the Sumar spokesman explained that from 2005 to 2019 these polluting emissions have increased in Europe by 34 percent, which is equivalent to 147 million tons of carbon.
“If we do nothing with the aviation sector and we do not transfer air transport to rail transport, these emissions will continue to increase by 28 percent until the year 2050 until reaching 180 million tons of CO2 in Europe and therefore it is essential , as France has done, that we transfer air routes to land routes”, he has reasoned to explain that this would imply eliminating several routes that currently operate in Spain.
Sumar’s electoral program includes among its points in terms of transportation promoting strategies that promote the transfer of users from plane to rail, reducing the rates of AVE and long distance tickets to improve territorial connectivity. During the last legislature, the United We Can group presented an initiative to limit these short flights when there is a fast rail alternative.
Sumar’s programmatic proposal also includes a tax on luxury vehicles, private planes, large yachts and frequent peninsular or business class flights.
At the same time, it advocates an increasing rate on frequent air travel that would take effect from the second annual flight, as well as eliminating the “aircraft tax privileges” and introducing a tax on aviation fuel to avoid “dumping economic” of this medium in relation to terrestrial ones.
“BRAVE” POLICIES AGAINST THE “DENIALISM” OF THE RIGHT
Urtasun has affirmed in a generic way that the irruption of this new heat wave forces Spain to face the “new reality in terms of a climate emergency”, where there is no “denial” in the face of climate change and “brave” measures to convert the country in a referent of green policies.
For example, he has insisted on the plan to properly air-condition schools, health centers and residences, the promotion of renewable energy to guarantee cheap energy to the population, “cutting up” the activity of large energy companies to break the “oligopoly” that now rules the market and generate half a million green jobs.
With this package of measures, the spokesman for Sumar has stated that Spain could meet the objectives of the European green pact in 20140, which in his opinion the PP is trying to boycott, which is equivalent to ten years before what is established in this agreement (2050 ).
“In the past there were more deaths from heat than from traffic accidents and in the same way that we have been able to reduce deaths from traffic accidents in this country by 80%, we must also be able to protect our citizens and place Spain in the best conditions to face this climate emergency”, he insisted.
