REPORT FROM THE GREEN NEW DEAL AND CLIMATE CHANGE SEMINARS

GREEN NEW DEAL and POST-COPENHAGEN WORKSHOPS, 03.02.10 and 04.02.10
Two interesting meetings about two of the most important issues
for us as Greens were held in the European Parliament on february the 3rd and 4th.



On Wednesday 3rd February, there was a Green Family Workshop with the title
"Implementing the Green New Deal for Europe." In his introduction to the
workshop, the EGP's Co-Spokesperson Philippe Lamberts MEP explained that the
main purpose of the workshop was to discuss how our concept of the Green New
Deal which worked well for us in the European elections can be put into
practice. The meeting was also intended to identify where we have
differences of opinion, either in terms of substance or formulation.



The meeting discussed 3 papers: "The employment dimension of the Green New
Deal", "A Green New Deal for Europe's industry" and "A new macro-economic
framework for the Green New Deal." Following the workshop, the 3 papers will
be redrafted following written submissions of proposed changes and additions
by the workshop's participants. The redrafted papers will then be sent to
member parties (all member parties, not just those who sent a representative
to the workshop) for consultation. The papers will finally be voted on at
the EGP's Autumn Conference in October 2010.There will be a public event in
the European Parliament on March 3rd which will include a discussion on
financing for the Green New Deal with bankers , venture capitalists and
others and a debate on Greens' views of economic growth.



On Thursday 4th February, a Workshop was held with the title "Beyond
Copenhagen: where to go for global climate policy?" The moderator of the
first session, Yannick Jadot MEP, explained that the main objectives of this
workshop were to discuss and move towards agreement on what our policy
priorities should be between now and the COP 16 summit in Mexico in late
November/ early December 2010.



The meeting started with analysis of what went wrong in Copenhagen and why
and how we can avoid those mistakes can be avoided in Mexico, before moving
onto what Greens should be doing to increase the chances of COP 16 being a
success. The morning session was addressed by 3 speakers with different
insights into what happened in Copenhagen and what should happen now.



Mark Lynas, adviser to the Government of the Maldives and environmental
activist, expressed his view that the biggest problem at COP15 and still the
biggest obstacle to real progress now, is that neither the US nor China, the
world's biggest polluters, are prepared to take the necessary measures
because of their domestic situation. However, on a more hopeful note, a
"progressive block" could be built and could include vulnerable countries
(so-called V11 ), as well as other countries, possibly including Brazil and
some Annexe 1 countries such as Australia.



For Martin Khor, Executive Director of the South Centre, the failure of
Copenhagen was not the lack of a final agreement as it had been obvious for
some while that there would be no meaningful agreement. The real failure was
the result of "the Danish government convening a meeting of 26 leaders in
the last 2 days of the conference, in an attempt to override the painstaking
negotiations taking place throughout the two weeks and in fact in the past
two to four years." This meeting lead to a complete absence of the Kyoto
targets previously agreed and this was the major failure of Copenhagen.
Martin Khor argued that if developed countries want to continue to pollute,
they should be made to pay a fund to developing countries. As for what we do
now, the priority is to get the multilateral process back on track. There
could be a combination of all countries on one level and then smaller
groupings of countries and regions.



Jason Anderson, from WWF's European Policy Office, gave a summary of the
situation in the United States. He said that although Obama was extremely
disappointing in Copenhagen, there is still a lot to be played for with the
climate legislation currently going through Congress. In response to
question from EGP Co-Spokesperson, Monica Frassoni, he said that the short
term there isn't much space for the US to do more than what they have
committed themselves to do but in the long-terms, we have to find ways of
getting them to commit to a more ambitious long –term trajectory.



Laurence Tubiana, from the Institut de Developpement Durable et Relations
Internationales, said that every time that the EU has shown it believes in
the transformation needed, it can and does get a lot of attention from the
US and others. The problem is that in 2009 the EU displayed internal
divisions and couldn't take that extra step to capitalise on the Energy and
climate Package. There is not the willingness to give up a degree of
sovereignty because we can be stronger and quicker working as a bloc.





WHAT CAN GREENS DO : INTERNAL DISCUSSION

The afternoon session consisted of an internal discussion of what Greens
should be doing between now and the COP 16 in Mexico. This internal session
discussed a range of possible approaches, including which coalitions we can
build and how we can channel and focus the anger and frustration felt by so
many people after the Copenhagen fiasco so that we can motivate once more
our campaigners and citizens at large.