People power vital to climate deal - minister

Miliband calls for global movement to pressure governments into action• Audio: Ed Miliband talks to the Guardian
David Adam and Juliette Jowit
The Guardian, Monday December 8 2008

A global campaign in the style of Make Poverty History is needed to pressure political leaders into sealing a treaty on tackling climate change, Ed Miliband, the environment secretary, has said.
Miliband told the Guardian a "popular mobilisation" was needed to help politicians push through an agreement to limit carbon emissions in the face of concerns about the economy. "There will be some people saying 'we can't go ahead with an agreement on climate change, it's not the biggest priority'. And, therefore, what you need is countervailing forces. Some of those countervailing forces come from popular mobilisation."
He added: "I think back to Make Poverty History ... and that was a mass movement that was necessary to get the agreement. In terms of climate change, it's even more difficult. There are people who have legitimate concerns, whether it's businesses in Europe who are concerned about competitiveness, or people who [ask] is it really necessary to do this now."
His view comes as environment ministers prepare to attend UN talks in Poznan, Poland, on the likely shape of a global deal to succeed the Kyoto protocol. The talks aim to secure an agreement at a meeting in Copenhagen this time next year.
"When you think about all the big historic movements, from the suffragettes, to anti-apartheid, to sexual equality in the 1960s, all the big political movements had popular mobilisation," said Miliband. "Maybe it's an odd thing for someone in government to say, but I just think there's a real opportunity and a need here."
He denied trying to pass the responsibility for tackling global warming from politicians to the public. "Political change comes from leadership and popular mobilisation. And you need both of them."
Make Poverty History made history itself when a coalition of British charities and celebrities such as Bono and Richard Curtis rallied hundreds of organisations from around the world, and millions of individuals wearing white wristbands, to press the G8 group of leading industrial countries to commit in 2005 to spend $50bn (£34bn) to tackle global poverty.
Environment and development groups said campaigns will grow in the run-up to Copenhagen, but warned they would include protests against UK plans to expand aviation and new coal plants. "He [Miliband] is going to get his wish, but he must be quite clear what he wishes for because it's going to be very hardnosed," said Benedict Southworth, director of the World Development Movement.
Ashok Sinha, director of Stop Climate Chaos, a UK-based umbrella group of organisations with 4 million members, said cutting domestic emissions was the best way the UK could get global action. There is also concern about the government's motivation, given there are several organisations trying to get mass support. And there were warnings that the climate would be hard to win public support for: first, because it has had less time to build up - Make Poverty History was a decade in the making; second, unlike action on poverty, individuals would have to make personal sacrifices, such as flying less.
"It would be helpful if there was a Make Poverty History mobilisation around climate change, but that shouldn't preclude political leadership now ... we need urgent action," said Mike Childs, head of campaigns for Friends of the Earth in the UK.
Elsewhere talks are continuing in Brussels on measures to cut EU carbon emissions by 20-30% by 2020. Last night it emerged that the French president, Nicholas Sarkozy, and Germany's chancellor, Angela Merkel, had agreed to push for the cuts.