Brussels, 24/01/2008 (Agence Europe) - European Commission President José Manuel Barroso presented the energy-climate package to the European Parliament at a plenary session specially convened for the purpose in Brussels on 23 January.
Setting out the contents of the package and the targets to be achieved, he said: “The package of measures proposed today is the most far-reaching legislative proposals to be made by the European Commission for many years”. Anticipating criticism of the cost of the plan, he said that “the cost of inaction is more than ten times” the cost of what was being proposed, before going on to stress, “This package represents an opportunity for Europe to show itself at its best. Tackling an issue of fundamental long-term importance”.
Almost all the MEPs who spoke, began by acknowledging the Commission's efforts, before going on to offer various criticisms. Marianne Thyssen (EPP-ED, Belgium) said she wanted the EU to work to protect both the climate and an efficient economy able to deliver jobs.
“Now we have to apply all that,” said Austrian MEP Hannes Swoboda, deputy leader of the PES. While recommending “an alliance between ecology, industry and workers”, he said he thought that international agreements between the EU and third countries were “essential” in this area, and he warned: “We must not give the impression that we are hesitant”. “We have to invest quickly in research,” he added, “to get to the second generation of biofuels and a positive ecological balance sheet”. Swoboda was not the only MEP to be critical of the Commission's proposed 10% share for biofuels.
Liam Aylward (UEN, Ireland) also said this threshold was “too high a target”. Arguing for a more flexible system, he recommended that “the 10% should be re-assessed in case of food shortages”. Roberto Musacchio (GUE, Italy) questioned the excessive importance given to biofuels and CO2 capture techniques. “We could squander our credibility,” he warned.
Rebecca Harms (Green-EFA, Germany) said she thought that the attacks on the package by European industries were unacceptable. In similar fashion, the deputy leader of the group and member of the energy committee Claude Turmes (Luxembourg) thanked the Commission for “not giving in to the electricity lobby”.
Karl-Heinz Florenz (EPP, Germany) regretted the lack of concrete measures in the package. He was also critical that waste treatment policy had not been given a larger role in the Commission's proposals. Giles Chichester (EPP, UK) warned against “the temptation to be technology specific and obsessive about renewables, when it is the objective of drastic emissions reduction that matters most”.
Chairman of the temporary committee on climate change Guido Sacconi (PES, Italy) refused to comment on the substance of the package, not having had the time to read and analyse it. However, he called for a special working procedure to be set up to allow the Parliament and Council to pass the proposals before the European elections in 2009. “We have 13 months to make major decisions,” said Lena Ek (ALDE, Sweden).
Two PES MEPs, Reino Paasilinna (Finland) and Britta Thomsen (Denmark) bemoaned the fact that account had not been taken of the social dimension in the Commission's proposals. “The Commission has not given enough thought to employment,” said Paasilinna.
Several MEPs also questioned the use of each country's gross domestic product per inhabitant to share out the efforts to be made. Françoise Grossetête (EPP, France) said that this was not a good criterion for setting these targets. “The overall effort must depend on member states' emissions levels at the start,” she argued. Guntars Krasts (UEN, Latvia) said that it was not right that some countries which had already reduced their CO2 emissions “should be able to rest on their laurels”.
Two MEPs questioned the validity of the energy-climate package, challenging the notion of global warming. Graham Booth (IND/DEM, UK) said firstly that the temperature of the Earth had not risen for some ten years and that, today, “there are more deaths due to the cold than to the heat”. “The options you are proposing are not the right ones,” he told Barroso. In the same line, Bogdan Pek (UEN, Poland) was more harsh than his British colleague. He accused Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas of incompetence. Basing his comments on “a study signed by some one hundred scientists from all over the world,” he stated that “attempts to combat climate change are nonsensical and lead to insufficient investment”. (L.B.S.)