THE GUARDIAN

COMMENT

The fight against global warming needs a champion in government

Thursday January 27, 2005

Let me explain why. Since his departure from the cabinet, Byers has been on a quiet personal journey, and is now a man with a mission. He's become, rather to his own surprise, a committed environmentalist. A year ago, he was pretty unenlightened about the whole issue - much like the rest of us. Now, he says, he has the zeal of a convert.

The reason for this fervour is his chairmanship of the International Climate Change Task Force, which this week called for the G8 group of nations to form its own taskforce to reduce carbon emissions across the world. He has been working with a US Republican senator with the spectacular name of Olympia Snowe, making her sound a bit like a thinktank in Davos where Tony Blair has been telling the world's glitziest business leaders that time is running out on climate change.

As a political issue, global warming does not exactly brim with attractions for Tony Blair. It means hard and unpopular decision-taking and leadership now, so that when the climate changes really start to hurt, in 10 years' time, it isn't too late. Scientists are expressing extreme alarm and we are probably already at five minutes to midnight. But by the time voters are likely to be applauding the painful measures needed, Mr Blair will be long retired.

Africa, his other top priority for Britain's G8 year, offers an instructive contrast. There, action is self-evidently urgent and has an immediate, visible impact. That cause can mobilise some of the planet's more powerful, glamorous and well-known figures - Nelson Mandela, Bill Gates, Bono, the Clintons. Even George Bush sees the point of campaigns on Aids and water.

The money from taxpayers and charity donors is collectively large but individually tiny: few people go broke because of a 0.7 % GDP target or a cheque to Oxfam.

But the politics of global warming challenges all our lifestyles. Sustainable energy means, in practice, ugly wind farms across the countryside; that one-time bugbear nuclear power is again being discussed; and the "great car economy" will have to be confronted. To make things worse, it has the passionate support of few global stars, its science is complicated and it knows no boundaries, so that one democracy's sacrifices can be wiped out elsewhere.

Finally, it is even harder than Africa to sell to the Americans. It isn't just Bush: as Byers himself pointed out recently, the Senate voted 95 to zero against Kyoto.

Yet there are reasons to hope that Tony Blair will do more than make a few high-minded speeches. Some of those reasons are direct and personal: his son Euan has apparently been badgering his father on the issue, and Blair Senior made coded references to the fact in a speech last year, saying that "on climate change, it is parents who should listen to their children".

Euan is not alone among young people: the environment is an issue that can mobilise younger voters and floating voters who may not be so interested in the intricacies of NHS reform, but want a government with vision.

Then there is history, that shadowy friend and menace, half the time with its hand on Tony's shoulder, the other half shaking an angry fist. Having pre-announced his exit from No 10, then, assuming Labour wins well in May, he will be in a similar position to George Bush, not having to worry about the electorate too much.

No issue is bigger than climate change. Britain, on course to meet its Kyoto targets, is particularly well placed for international leadership. And Blair could, at last, be a little daring. Given his reputation for caution in confronting business, that would do him nothing but good.

Even the American problem is not quite as awesome as sometimes painted. Kyoto may be out, but increasingly individual US states are taking initiatives. Some 10 to 12 northern states are now promoting their own system of carbon trading. And even pumped-up Arnie Schwarzenegger in California is said to be a convert to environmentalist issues.

So a new crusade against carbon emissions is not only vital for the world, it is even politically possible, too. To make it happen in Whitehall, however, it needs a genuine champion, someone who can keep the issue in front of the prime minister's nose, week in, week out. There is no point in it being an outsider.

No one would deny the excellent work Margaret Beckett has put in as environment secretary. But she is not of the inner circle. No, it has to be one of Blair's own; and the obvious candidate is Byers. Some commentators would complain he hasn't yet done his time. But if Blair doesn't have the grit to shrug that off, he's going to achieve nothing in a third term anyway.

jackie.ashley@guardian.co.uk

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