French President Nicolas Sarkozy still wants to see a “carbon tax” put in place at the European Union’s borders to keep from adding “environmental dumping to social dumping”. He proposed the idea for the first time last September. “I will fight to get a carbon tax at Europe’s borders,” he declared as he extended his New Year’s wishes to economic interest groups, on 6 January in Cholet.

“I am for free trade but I do not see why we should impose environmental constraints on our companies if we agree to import goods manufactured in countries lacking environmental constraints,” said the head of state. “We will tax such countries at the border with the carbon tax,” he pledged, adding: “competition has to be fair; we are not going to add environmental dumping to social dumping”.

In France, the proposed tax was rejected by the Constitutional Council, which ruled that it did not treat all companies equally. A new version is on the agenda for 20 January. In the initial law, heavy industries were not taxable because they are already covered by the EU’s Emission Trading Scheme.