PES Manifesto

Socialists debate about proposals to be delivered on climate change in Stockholm, Sweden

Published Wednesday, May 28, 2008 at 15:40
by Editor (1163 views and 0 comments)

As we mentioned in one of our last posts, the theme “Save our Planet” of the PES manifesto was discussed in Stockholm, Sweden, with an extremely positive outcome! The purpose, obviously, was to add input to the manifesto2009 for the European Elections of June next year

Fighting climate change with the right attitude

The seminar on “Leading the fight against climate change: a new European green growth agenda” was held on the 23 May at the headquarters of the SAP, the Swedish social-democratic party.

Mona Sahlin, SAP party leader and PES manifesto theme leader on “Save Our Planet”, opened the seminar by saying that “problems in our society don’t disappear only wanting to, but taking action”. Politics and the market should work together to build strategies for a sustainable future, enhancing investments, public incentives for new technologies and influencing the public. According to her, the EU should go ahead in the fight against climate change promoting a comprehensive directive addressing action to be taken in all sectors, a directive on renewables and EU budget and structural funds to be used in investing in new technologies.

The need for a shift in consumption and production

MEP Linda McAvan, vice-president responsible for climate change in the socialist group, presented the new EU package on climate change, a new set of proposals which will include as the main points an expanded ETS (Emission Trading Scheme) mechanism, directives on car emissions and on renewables. She highlighted the need to take into consideration some controversial issues such as the problems of eastern countries in catching up with the other member states, the importance of making sure that biofuels will not have negative effects on environment and society and that ETS mechanism will not affect competitiveness especially of heavy industries. The second speaker to intervene was Svante Axelsson, general secretary of the Swedish society for nature conservation. According to Axelsson, money has to be used in a different direction, increasing the price of old technologies, so getting a total shift in production and consumption. His main ideas were the introduction of a megawatts trade mechanism working like the ETS system and the removal of the income support provided under the Common Agricultural Policy, in order to use the money saved to support a more sustainable production. MEP Ǻsa Westlund, member of the Environment committee, closed the first panel of the seminar focusing on the problem of communication with the public. She stated that “socialists believe in politics to lead the way in this fight, but it has to be tackled in a fair way, otherwise we will lose democratic support”. It is therefore a matter of providing people the right incentives and opportunities, making for them easier to notice the results.

Sustainable transport in a sustainable Europe

The second panel of the seminar shifted the debate to sustainable transport. Apart from the promotion of new clean cars, it is of utmost importance to include aviation in the ETS system in order to force the sector to cut emissions. According to Carin Jämtin, deputy mayor of Stockholm, cities in Europe will have a major role to play in planning a reliable and sustainable transport system and investing in infrastructures. In this respect, Stockholm and Göteborg policies such as the combination of a congestion tax and the promotion of public transport can be taken as good examples of what can be done.

Since climate change is an environmental, economic and social issue, it has to be tackled from different perspectives at the same time. There are no easy choices, nor easy solutions, but politics has the responsibility of pushing in the right direction.

For more information on the socialist group in the European Parliament and Climate Change click here.

Tags: climate change, transport