Climate Change

I have made it clear that leaders do have a very important role to play. What President Obama does is obviously a matter for him, but we have made it clear that we think that leaders need to be part of a Copenhagen agreement if we are to secure the agreement we want. Let me conclude by repeating that we need to keep our focus on a good deal, not just any deal. A deal without numbers would be a bad deal; a deal without developed country commitments would not be a good deal; and a deal without action from developing countries would not be a good deal. The central task of any agreement is to show that we can be on, at worst, the 2° pathway, and that we have a credible way of peaking global emissions. The world has never done that before throughout its industrial history and it is a very big prize. I wish to end on a note of optimism. There are huge difficulties, because of the scale of the task that we face. As I have said in our discussions with other countries, every country faces its compelling constraints in this, be it the US, where the debate is behind that in other countries, or India, because of the number of its people who are in poverty and the fact that it needs to grow. The truth is that we will succeed in tackling this only if we understand each other's constraints and show ambition. If we can conclude a successful agreement in Copenhagen, I do not think that people will look back and say, "This was a mistake." I think that people will look back and say, "This was an historic moment. It was actually easier than people thought to make the kind of changes that we need to make." As the chief scientist in the US said to me, once we start to turn around this inexorable rise in emissions, people will say, "Actually, the quality of life can be better, our economy can be better and it was not so hard after all." The aim at Copenhagen is not only to avoid environmental disaster, but to build a better life for people here and around the world, and I hope that we can agree something that those in all parts of the House can support.