The UK’s Guardian reports that Prime Minister David Cameron’s promise to run the “greenest government ever” is under threat:
The European parliament on Tuesday rejected a key report that would have toughened the EU stance on greenhouse gas emissions, after political wrangling that wrecked hopes of a compromise.
A rebellion by the UK’s Tory MEPs helped to swing the vote against a tougher target on how much carbon emissions should be cut by 2020, but was not decisive, according to insiders.
The vote does not put an end to green campaigners’ hopes of a more ambitious emissions reduction target – a higher cut of 30% by 2020 on 1990 levels rather than 20% – as the issue will continue to be debated, but is a setback.
The political wrangling involved a series of amendments, proposed by Conservative groupings of MEPs, that would have weakened the resulting resolution to an extent that was not acceptable to the Green MEP grouping.
Greens in the parliament will now try to push for the tougher target in future votes, and through the involvement of member states and the European commission.
Anyone familiar with the EU’s tendency to force votes on an issue until it gets own way will not fall into the trap of celebrating this news too vigorously. But when gravy-train Eurocrats reject a measure because it is too “unilateral,” there is hope for Europe yet.
The rest here.