Public debate needed on climate change after Kyoto

Climate change MP Colin Challen MP on Thursday called upon the Government to publish its favoured post-Kyoto climate change framework following the publication of the Fourth United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) report on the state of the global environment.

The report paints a picture of steadily accelerating degradation of the earth's life support systems.

The chair of the All Party Parliamentary Climate Change Group has launched an Early Day Motion that notes that the Government should allow for public debate on the kind of framework it favours. The text of the EDM reads:

"This House welcomes the publication of the UNEP Fourth Global Environment Outlook report; notes that the report provides alarming evidence of the further degradation of the planet's sustainability; that this degradation threatens the lives and living standards of hundreds of millions of people; that the report is yet another step in a long process which has failed to produce an international framework designed to deal with climate change faster than the problem is being created; that the government has often referred to its study of such frameworks, without conclusion; now calls upon the government to end this
indeterminate process and publish for public debate its preferred option for a future framework to deal with climate change."

Colin Challen said today: "The Government should be bold and tell us now what it thinks should be the essential shape of its framework to deal with climate change post-Kyoto. The UNEP report makes it plain that the luxury of time that we in the developed countries have taken for granted in dealing with climate change has not been enjoyed elsewhere in the world, where the environment is failing on a massive scale.

"Just as the Government has entered a consultation on the future of nuclear power stating from the outset what its preferred option was, then there is no reason why it cannot start a public debate on this issue by stating what its favoured option is.

"I am calling on the Government to publish a Green Paper, and not to delay public consideration any longer of what will be its position on perhaps the most important treaty we will ever have to sign."