FRANKFURT. (Reuters). – On Monday, Christine Lagarde the President of European Central Bank is facing a backlash by conservative legislators who view the ECB’s green strategy as a distraction from its responsibility to keep inflation under control.

Lagarde has made joining the fight against climate change a key goal and the ECB pledged https://www.reuters.com/business/environment/ecb-ramps-up-its-role-tacking-climate-change-2021-07-08 last year to take greater account of the environment in core policy decisions, such as which bonds to buy in its multi-trillion-euro stimulus programme.

Lagarde is due in Parliament on Monday. However, European People’s Party lawmakers took exception to Lagarde’s foray into a policy field that was not within the ECB’s remit. This especially comes as inflation is high.

While the ECB can be independent from parliament, the objections of lawmakers could slow down a debate about the role of the central banks in the Euro zone’s climate and strengthen some rate-setting conservatives.

“The ECB’s primary mandate is ensuring price stability, which at the moment the ECB is not doing a great job at,” German lawmaker Markus Ferber said in an emailed statement to Reuters. “Everything else, such as the “green shift”, is just a distraction from our primary mandate.

Georgios Kyrtsos, his colleague, and he have submitted several amendments to paragraphs relating the ECB’s Climate Strategy in a Report by the European Parliament. The vote is scheduled for Tuesday.

They also suggested that the ECB stick to market neutrality, which means buying bonds at a proportion of the amount outstanding. This would make it impossible to buy “greener” bonds and less from high-polluting companies.

“Ferber and Kyrtsos’ attempt to reinstate explicit European Parliament support for the principle of market neutrality would be a major step back in the debate on green monetary policy,” said Alessia Del Vasto, advocacy officer at campaign group Positive Money Europe.

Ferber said that environment goals cannot be achieved via monetary tools. The ECB will “create distortions” if it “only/predominantly buys green bonds” as the market for those securities is small.

A spokeswoman for the ECB did not respond immediately to our request. Lagarde will appear before parliament at 1615 GMT.