Left-wing green party GroenLinks says it will not support the government’s climate plans unless ministers introduce a national carbon dioxide tax for industry.

GroenLinks leader Jesse Klaver told a meeting in The Hague on Monday night that the coalition cannot count on his party in the senate unless it brings in a tax on CO2 emissions.

Elections for the country’s 12 provincial governments take place in two months’ time. Those elections will also determine the make-up of the senate, or upper house of parliament, and the ruling coalition is extremely likely to lose its majority, forcing it to look to opposition parties for support.

Klaver used Monday’s meeting to launch the party’s own draft legislation to bring in a CO2 tax. ‘These are climate elections,’ Klaver said. ‘We will not sign any political climate agreement which does not include a CO2 tax’.

“Het gaat er vaak over: wat doe jij als individu?

Maar zo pak je klimaatverandering niet aan.

We moeten vragen: wat doen de grote vervuilers?”

– @jesseklaver bij de Q&A #Meetup pic.twitter.com/qpYEKQ0GBM

— GroenLinks (@groenlinks) January 21, 2019

The money raised by the tax should be used to reduce energy taxes for consumers and to help companies which want to make their operations more sustainable, Klaver said.

The coalition climate agreement, published before the Christmas break was widely criticised for giving industry an easy ride.

Employers

On Tuesday afternoon, Hans de Boer, leader of the VNO-NCW employers federation said Klaver is spreading fake news.

‘He and others are creating an image of industry as the biggest polluter and which is unwilling to pay anything,’ he said. This, De Boer says, goes against the facts.

‘Industry is responsible for 25% of Dutch CO2 output, but will take responsibility for cutting emissions by one third in return for just one sixth of the subsidies,’ he told NOS.