Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-12-16-Speech-2-337"
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"en.20081216.36.2-337"2
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"Madam President, my thanks to Mrs Doyle for all her hard work. This morning President Sarkozy said that compromise is the spirit of Europe. Well, unfortunately I do not think that sentiment will be much of a consolation in just a few decades from now, when people look back at 2008 and ask themselves what on earth were politicians thinking about. Knowing what they knew then, why on earth did they not do more to save all of us from the unbearable impacts of a warming planet? Why did they not act with more urgency and determination?
I think that is a question we should be asking ourselves, because the science is very clear: that 20% emission reductions by 2020 is simply no way near ambitious enough to give us any serious likelihood of avoiding a 2°C temperature increase. And scandalously looking at the package as a whole, well over half of that utterly inadequate emissions reduction could in any case be outsourced to developing countries. That is not only scientifically unsound, it is also ethically wrong.
Meanwhile the emissions trading system is itself being turned into a windfall profit machine for Europe’s most polluting industries. Instead of learning from the first phases of the ETS, we appear to be creating laws that would subsidise these industries and delay still further our transition to a more sustainable economy. So I am afraid I cannot share Mr Sarkozy’s celebration of compromise, not when that compromise is made up of countless corporate concessions which put the profits of industry literally before the liveability of this planet. Not when that compromise means that sectors representing fully 96% of the non-power emissions are to be given 100% free allocation of permits. Not when that means the carbon price will be driven so low that there will be nothing like the necessary stimulus for investment in green energy alternatives.
This is not a day for celebration: it is a day to reflect on how much more is needed to generate the political will to stand a chance of avoiding the worst of climate chaos. And a day to reflect that yet another opportunity for real change has sadly been lost."@en1
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