PES leaders appeal to EU to unilaterally lower emissions by 30%

Gemensamt uttalande från vårt europeiska möte där jag representerade Sverige:

Socialist and social democratic party leaders, environment ministers, Members of Parliament and opinion formers from across the EU meet yesterday evening for high level round table discussions in Copenhagen at the Bella Centre.

The round table participants agreed that Climate Change and the economic crisis need to be addressed together and solutions must include a social dimension.

Poul Nyrup Rasmussen, President of the Party of European Socialists (PES), summed up the discussions: “The governments must agree on a framework for a global agreement with binding emission reduction targets for developed countries and clear commitments by emerging economies. We need a binding roadmap to finalise a climate change contract and Europe should take the lead. The PES round table is calling on the EU to unilaterally decide to reduce their emissions by 30% by 2020."

“Climate policy is also a social policy. We urge all participants in Copenhagen to include in the agreement a strategy to protect the most vulnerable in developing, emerging, but also developed countries from climate change. COP15 needs to agree on a fair transition based on solidarity and make sufficient funding for developing countries available.”

“Climate change and the economic crisis need to be tackled together. We need to agree on funding to secure investment to fight unemployment and to guarantee a fair restructuring of brown jobs to green economies.”

“A financial transaction tax would allow us to support green growth and to undergo a fair transition to a greener and more social Europe and planet.”