Martin Caton

Gower MP says “Climate Change is a Social Justice Issue”

This winter, Gower MP, Martin Caton, spoke to the Wales Labour Grassroots Conference held in County Hall, Swansea on the issue of tackling climate change.

He described the challenge presented by global warming as “the greatest threat facing our planet at this time – maybe the greatest humanity has ever faced”.  He said, “It is not just an environmental dilemma but a socio-economic issue that, at its heart, is also about social justice.

“If we allow the accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere to exceed 450 parts per million, that will mean a temperature rise greater than 2ºC by 2050, then we are playing with fire.  We could well be allowing irreversible change to kick off, like the melting of the Greenland ice sheet that will devastate parts of our planet.

“But, of course, the responsibility for the production of greenhouse gases is not shared equally throughout the world and, sure enough, its disastrous impact will not be felt equally across the planet.

“It is the rich, mostly western, industrial nations that have contributed and continue to contribute the largest share of the problem gases in the atmosphere.  And it is those same rich countries that will be best able to introduce mitigating measures and adapt ways of living when the consequences of climate change impact.

“The big losers would be the poorest people in the poorest countries on the planet – the people who, ironically, have virtually no carbon footprint to speak of.

“The 19 million people living in New York State have a bigger carbon footprint than the 766 million people living in the world’s 50 poorest countries.  The 60 million people in Britain produce more CO2 than the 472 million living in Egypt, Nigeria, Pakistan and Vietnam combined.  An average dishwasher in Europe emits as much CO² in a year as three Ethiopians.

"Even aside from the vulnerability that comes with their poverty, cruelly the geographical location of many of these people makes them the most likely early victims of rises in average temperatures.”

Martin called for clear, ambitious greenhouse gas emission targets and urgent use of taxation, regulation, focused public spending and land use planning.  He also called for the development of the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme with carbon priced to achieve real greenhouse gas reductions and to move as rapidly as possible to a global ‘cap and trade’ scheme after the Kyoto round comes to an end in 2012.

He said, “I think the model we should be aiming at is along the lines of the ‘Contraction and Convergence’ proposals developed by the Global Commons Institute.  That means contraction of overall global emission to reach the target concentration of less than 450 parts per million CO2 in the atmosphere.  At the same time convergence, so that per capita emission moves towards a common amount in a process parallel to contraction.

"It’s redistributive in terms of wealth and power and it will establish a world community responsible for the future of our planet."