Lord Prescott: Ditch binding agreement on emissions
Negotiators should ditch hopes of a legally binding agreement on reductions in climate change gases and push instead for a voluntary framework at the upcoming Cancun summit, former deputy prime minister John Prescott said today.
After President Barack Obama's "shellacking" at the hands of Republican opponents in mid-term elections, there was no prospect of the US Congress approving legal requirements to cut greenhouse gas emissions, said Lord Prescott, who was a key UK negotiator at the Kyoto global warming conference in 1997.
Lord Prescott, now the Council of Europe rapporteur on climate change issues, said that the Kyoto Protocol should be extended for five years beyond its 2012 expiry date to allow time for a voluntary system of verifiable emission reductions to be introduced.
After the failure to achieve a legally binding agreement at last year's Copenhagen summit, it would be "disastrous" if the UN-sponsored gathering kicking off in the Mexican city of Cancun on November 29 were also to end in stalemate, he said.
Lord Prescott, in Beijing for talks with Chinese premier Wen Jiabao ahead of the crucial summit, told BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "In America, they couldn't get agreement on Kyoto, then Obama came along and said he accepts the science.
"I heard him after his election disaster. Now they are saying they don't want to be involved in any kind of legal agreement. So forget the legal agreement - you can't get it. That's the reality.
"The Americans can't deliver anyway and if they tried to get something through Congress, they couldn't get it anyway."
He added: "Let's have a voluntary agreement. Let's stop the clock. Instead of Kyoto having to be done by 2012, stop it for about five years, put in a voluntary agreement and a verification system.
"It's only a small step, but I think the worst thing that could happen would be a failure at Cancun. If common sense applies and we are thinking about our children and our children's children, let's get an agreement."
