UK:British prime minister Tony Blair has vowed Britain will lead the world in battling climate change, as his environment secretary David Miliband unveiled proposals to set legally binding carbon reduction targets, Frank Millar, London Editor.
With Conservative leader David Cameron competing to establish blue as the new green in British politics, Mr Blair's expected successor, chancellor Gordon Brown, has also urged Britons to rally to the cause of a sustainable environment in the same way that they previously backed the "Make History Poverty" campaign.
At the same time, Mr Miliband - who is being encouraged by some Blairities and former ministers to join the race to succeed Mr Blair - described climate change as a "threshold issue" now in British politics, in the same way as national security and law and order.
The draft Climate Change Bill unveiled to MPs yesterday envisages an independent panel to set ministers a "carbon budget" every five years, with a binding commitment to cut UK emissions by 60 per cent by 2050.
Future governments fai ing to meet the requirements of the Bill would be subject to judicial review, although Mr Miliband denied ministers would end up "at the Old Bailey".
The draft Bill sets an interim target of a 26-32 per cent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions by 2020. It sets out plans for greater energy efficiency, with more consumers becoming "producers" of their own energy at home, and encourages investment in low-carbon fuels and technologies, such as carbon capture and storage, wind, wave and solar power.
Addressing an audience of teenagers in Downing Street, Mr Blair described the new measures - which will now go out for consultation ahead of a full Bill in the autumn and expected royal assent next year - as "a revolutionary step".
He said each generation of political leaders was confronted by major and often different challenges. "Climate change is a bit of a different challenge but a challenge I believe that is the biggest long-term threat facing our world."
Mr Brown said: "The lesson of climate change is that each f us can make a difference but all of us together can make an even bigger difference."
Set to deliver what seems certain to be his last budget next week, he said future chancellors would "have to count the carbon just as they count the pennies" and account for their use of the country's resources just as they did for their use of public money.
"The world is changing in the way in which we measure the impact on the quality of life of what we do, and the approach we are setting out . . . is not just about better economics, it is about a better quality of life all round.
And I believe that the movement that started with 'Make History Poverty' to change the way we think about poverty in the world is a movement that can now begin again to make for a sustainable environment."
The Conservatives, who have taken a huge risk with many voters by pledging to use "green" taxes on air travel, said publication of the draft Bill was "a welcome step forward" but pressed for a rolling system of annual targets.
Liberal Democra spokesman Chris Huhne also said: "There is a possibility here [with five-year targets] that the government wouldn't really be held to account for what it had done or failed to do until after it had faced the electorate again."
The Green Party said setting a legal framework for carbon emissions was "a massive opportunity" but targets were "dangerously unambitious".