8th December 2005

Greens give a cautious welcome to David Cameron's statement that he is giving the issue of the environment 'a real priority' and will meet targets for 60 per cent CO2 reductions by 2050.

Tony Blair has proved a disaster for the environment: eight years pontificating about climate change while actively opposing the economic and policy changes that would have made a difference. CO2 emissions have increased remorselessly while British businesses have lost out to those in Germany, where green tax breaks have encouraged the development of recycling, renewable energy and more.

David Cameron can prove that he means what he says by accepting the Green party 12-point action plan for climate change that includes scrapping the £30 bn road-building programme, ending tax breaks to aviation and using £2bn in ecotaxes to fund small-scale renewables expansion. As an essential first step he needs to sign up to the Contraction & Convergence model for a fair per-capita global allocation of CO2 emissions to resolve the impasse of the Montreal climate change talks.

This is the minimum it would take to for him to claim convincingly that he is more committed to tackling climate change than Labour. He could also break traditional Tory funding links with heavily polluting industries, like aviation and road-building, to show that the interests of such companies wont influence policy.

Mr Cameron sees an opportunity to win support by ending the Tory pollute and privatise agenda - we'll have to wait to see whether he can bring the rest of his big-business party with him.
 

Cllr. Martin Whiteside, Stroud District Green party