International

Today in Strasbourg the European Parliament voted in favour of the so-called “Wijkman Report”, a policy document which asserts that nuclear power is a sustainable energy source and could provide a means to counter climate change. A proposal from the SP which stated the opposite of this won the support not only of the SP's own United Left Group (GUE/NGL) but also of most Greens and Social Democrats, but failed to gain a parliamentary majority.

During the debate over the Wijkman Report SP Euro-MP Kartika Liotard said that the nuclear power lobby must be grateful to the problems surrounding climate change: “They present themselves as an alternative with no regard to the enormous problem of nuclear waste. We shouldn't be replacing one environmental crisis by another,” she said.

Unfortunately it turned out that a majority of MEPs had been won over by the lobby's arguments and voted against Ms Liotard's amendment. Another amendment, in which it was asserted that unbridled 'market-working' style liberalisation, without limits on production and consumption would lead to more serious disturbance of the climate, also failed. However, an amendment from Ms Liotard to the effect that any extension of emissions trading to, for example, air transport should not be carried through at the expense of poorer countries did win the backing of a large majority.