Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2005-11-16-Speech-3-062"
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"en.20051116.4.3-062"2
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".
Mr President, this has been an interesting and stimulating debate, marked by almost total welcome – quite correctly – for Mr Wijkman’s report and for its contents, and by very real agreement on the nature and scale of the challenge. It has also been marked by a strong emphasis from many speakers on renewable resources, with various examples of this being cited, and also by strong differences of opinion over nuclear power. I would say to the last speaker, Mrs Harms, that if the only aspect of the climate change debate she heard in the UK was that of nuclear power, then she must have moved in very restricted circles, because there is a great deal being discussed in the UK, which has not actually made a fresh commitment to nuclear power, despite a commitment to discussing it. In fact, energy efficiency is top of the UK’s list of policies for tackling climate change, just as she would wish.
There has been much emphasis on what are usually known in the jargon as ‘co-benefits’. Some speakers emphasised the damage caused by air pollution by the same gases that are contributing to climate change, while others emphasised that, as we tackle climate change, we will derive other potential health benefits from the reduction in the use of those gases.
Mrs Gutiérrez-Cortines asked about the role of agriculture. As she may know, in countries such as New Zealand, livestock are the source of almost all greenhouse gas emissions, making this a particularly difficult problem to solve. There is therefore no doubt that agriculture can, in certain circumstances, be part of the problem. However, as a number of speakers mentioned with regard to biomass and biofuels, it also could also be part of the solution. That is an issue that will come under increasing scrutiny.
I am sorry Mr Hegyi is opposed to carbon capture and storage. The sad and blunt fact is that countries like India and China, which need to grow and develop in order to tackle poverty – and this was another issue referred to, again quite correctly, in the debate – have huge coal reserves and will use them, because they feel they have no choice. It is surely better for us to try to find ways of helping them to do that sustainably, through technologies like carbon capture and storage, rather than simply telling them not to use those power sources, which I fear would be fruitless.
All the references made to the most vulnerable states and to the most vulnerable within other countries heighten the need for the actions the EU must take on adaptation, and support for adaptation, to impacts that we cannot avoid. Strong emphasis has been placed on the role of the many other countries involved and on the need for a global dialogue – with which the Council wholeheartedly agrees – and there is clear agreement both that the EU should continue to take the lead internationally and that we should continue to place strong emphasis on delivering on our own programmes.
Mrs Doyle and Mr Hökmark both suggested that the EU is unlikely to meet its Kyoto targets. That is not my understanding of the latest position as assessed by the Commission. However, that is a report that we will be publishing as we approach Montreal, and it certainly remains the case that we must continue to maintain and indeed step up our own activity.
That brings me to the comments by both Mrs Lucas and Mr Smith, who quite rightly praised the ambition of the Wijkman report in setting a target of a 60% reduction in emissions by 2050, without apparently being aware that this is the target the UK Government set in its own Energy White Paper in 2003. Perhaps, though, this should come as no a surprise, since Mrs Lucas had nothing good to say about the UK’s approach. However, I must put it firmly on the record for her and on behalf of this Council that it is a waste of everybody’s time to demand that the EU deliver a formal mandate and a formal timetable in Montreal. This body above all should recognise that the world of imperialism is at an end. We cannot just march into Montreal and dictate to the rest of the world how they should conduct themselves and go about their business, not least when we are talking to some of the poorest and most vulnerable countries in the world whose priority, quite rightly, is development and feeding their populations. We will not act in this manner. If we are able to kindle a dialogue and spark a process in Montreal, it will be a real and substantial achievement, just as it was a real and substantial achievement to elicit the language and secure the programme of action agreed at Gleneagles. We all agree that we ought to be moving faster, but let us at least recognise the fact that we are making some progress."@en1
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