The Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, Ed Miliband gave a talk at the LSE last week about the politics of climate change and his aims in reaching a “comprehensive agreement” at Copenhagen.
Miliband focused on the UK’s responsibility in cutting carbon emissions, calling for a shift in politics rather than policies to secure any potential agreement’s future success. The Energy and Climate Change Secretary is due to travel with Gordon Brown to the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference next week in the hope of obtaining the “most ambitious agreement” possible.
In a special public lecture as part of the Ralph Miliband Lecture Series, he began by stressing the importance of the approaching December deadline in forcing the world to finalise an international compliance over the challenge. Despite reports in previous weeks suggesting an unlikelihood in reaching a legally binding treaty at the summit, he demonstrated a confidence in realising a “deal which will ensure that global emissions peak by 2020 at the latest”.
Miliband added that in the past week alone, Russia, Brazil and South Korea have each announced plans for major cuts in carbon emissions, reflecting an optimism surrounding the international mood towards ensuring an extensive agreement next month.
The Climate Change Minister, who studied an MSc in Economics at the LSE, proceeded by taking the opportunity to look past the Copenhagen conference and explore the type of politics needed for Britain to remain a long term consensus for lasting action in terms of transitional plans, emphasising the importance of an adaption of politics over policies.
Describing the “unprecedented scale” in the challenge of managing climate change, Ed Miliband highlighted his view that the world needs dramatic change that has to be implemented quickly, whilst remaining a permanent feature of the global society. The UK already has legislation in place to guarantee a cut in carbon emissions by 80 per cent and Miliband showed his awareness of the need to get past the “politics of now”, which he argued, is “not enough” to overcome the challenges of climate change, and “building and maintaining consent” within the UK to ensure the permanence an agreement.
The Labour Minister argued that without social acceptance of future policies in cutting carbon emissions, the terms of a change would be unsustainable; raising the question over what type of politics is needed to make this happen.
Turning to his proposition of a shift in the UK towards a “politics of the common good” and drawing upon experience from his own constituency, Darlington North, Miliband presented his main proposition in shifting politics in order to create a clear social justice and treat people as citizens rather than consumers. To the value of the audience, he acknowledged that parliament must be must be frank with people about the costs of the low carbon transition whilst making society aware of a sense of “fairness in the way energy is provided” in order to gain its support.
He added that although politicians hold a central role in creating politics which would easily encompass such change, it is the will of the people which has historically, and will continue to “change the world”. Referring to the group of young people in the crowd involved in the climate change movement wearing t-shirts saying “how old will you be in 2050?”, he reiterated a belief in the public and the self-interest aspect of a politics of common good in that there exists a public desire for change and that “social justice at its heart, we can have a low carbon transition that maintains public support”.
Miliband is facing the Copenhagen summit with evident optimism, to the amusement of the audience. He declared that he was “not a pessimist” and did not believe in a negative political outlook in tackling climate change; quoting a fellow politician:”if Martin Luther King said I have a nightmare, nobody would have followed him”.
At the close of the lecture, Ed Miliband assured the audience that although climate change is “not a problem that gets solved”, “people demanding change has, throughout history, changed the world.” He added that: “Nowhere is this more true than in relation to climate change, where the green movement has already moved opinion in so many countries.” His energy left a sense that this could be the moment the world finally secures an agreement to work towards reducing the effects of climate change.
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