Ed Miliband has urged Boris Johnson to “stay and fight” for a radical climate change deal in Glasgow.
Labour’s Shadow Energy secretary accused the Prime Minister of a ‘dereliction of duty” by turning up to the COP26 climate change crisis in Glasgow for a day when the negotiations look like missing the 1.5C target on carbon emissions by miles.
Miliband said: “I can’t believe for the life of me why he is going back to London today. He’s making this a day trip to the most important summit ever on climate change. When he is a host that is a dereliction of duty. He should be staying to get a grip.
He was speaking in Glasgow as the Prime Minister arrived at the Clydeside conference to host a press conference and hold a series of bilateral meetings with other leaders.
The former Labour leader highlighted how the draft agreement from the two weeks of talks issued on Wednesday would still leave a massive 28 billion tonne carbon gap on the emissions that should be stopped to prevent global temperatures rising.
He said: “I think we do need to be clear with three days of the summit to go that there is a chasm between where we are and where we need to be.
“The last 24 hours have been a pretty devastating reality check on the government attempts to frankly greenwash Glasgow.”
“Climate Action tracker tells us that rather than 1.5 degrees pledges for 2030 were are on track for a devastating 2.4 degrees which will mean billions of people suffering extreme heatwaves.”
“We need to reduce emissions from our projected 53 billion tonnes in 2030 to 25 billion tonnes by that date. That’s a 28 billion tonne gap and on the UN update from yesterday we’ve closed just 4.8 billion tonnes of that 28 billion tonnes gap. That is a long, long way from where we need to be.”
Ahead of the Prime Minister’s Glasgow press conference Miliband said Johnson had made strategic errors by announcing shallow agreements early on the in conference which made it harder to press for compromise now.
He added: “I think the message to world leaders from Boris Johnson today should be very clear, which is no more fudges no more loopholes, no more get out of jail free cards. "
"Above all he can’t be a commentator on this on the sidelines, he must take charge. We have to do everything in our power to salvage what we can from this summit.”
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