Climate Change might be the greatest threat to civilised human life on earth but we can be sure that Gordon Brown isn't going to do anything about it on his watch. Yes, he'll go to all the international conferences and make the right speeches. He'll probably encourage his chancellor to put an extra £25 on Vehicle Excise Duty for the largest vehicles and an extra fiver on APD but it is very much business as usual, nothing is going to happen that will upset anybody. Michael O'Leary won't be loosing any sleep. Look at his record. Brown has been chancellor for ten years.

Alan Simpson, MP for Nottingham South, has declared an intention to stand down as a Labour MP at the next election - BBC News.

Does anyone agree with petitioning him to stand as an independent 'anti-greenwash' candidate? This is, after all, someone who practises what he preaches.

"In a letter to his constituency party members, the MP said a Gordon Brown-led premiership would be even worse.

"Mr Simpson, 58 and first elected for Nottingham South in 1992, said there were "not enough" good Labour MPs.

A CALL ON SIR NICHOLAS STERN FOR DISCIPLINE ON
CONTRACTION AND CONVERGENCE

To avoid dangerous rates of climate change, we have to solve the problem
faster than we create it. Though this is a simple and obvious test, it
is a great challenge as rates of change towards an increasingly adverse
climate are already now well established.

Like others before it, Sir Nicholas Stern's recent report recognises the
challenge but does not rise to it. Rising to it means showing that we
are collectively organising to do enough soon enough globally to avoid
dangerous rates of climate change. In other words success requires that

To let you all know. I have started an e-petition to Tony Blair.

The petition calls for international adoption of Contraction and Convergence, and the adoption of Carbon Rationing to ensure we hit our UK targets. You can add you names at the link below:

http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/Carbon-Rationing/

The aim is to keep pushing this petition over the coming year, try and get some momentum going, so by next year's climate talks we have a significant petition to put before Gordon Brown or Tony Blair or whoever is PM at the time.

In the interview below, Blair is still saying that variations in the weather are the reason for not having annual CO2 targets. Annoyingly, interviewers seem to forget to suggest that the government statisticians would be quite able to adjust for this. He's also talking about carbon footprinting and budgeting; lobbying by David Miliband seems to be working.

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http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article1993581.ece

From today's Independent - with a little look-in from yours truly!

Margaret Beckett: You Ask The Questions

What measures can we persuade all EU countries to adopt to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 3 per cent each year? GEOFF FIRMIN, Epsom, Surrey

Annual targets aren't really practical, but all of us in Europe and beyond must cut our carbon emissions drastically. One key objective the Government is pursuing is the inclusion of aviation in the EU emissions trading scheme by 2007.

Polly Toynbee argues Gordon Brown should not keep his ideas in the bottom drawer until he walks into No 10 (Comment, June 6). But when it comes to the green agenda, the drawer may be empty. The Environmental Audit Committee said earlier in the year that it was mystified by Treasury timidity over green taxes.

The top rate tax on gas-guzzling cars, the equivalent of a cappuccino a month, introduced at the last budget was widely condemned. Someone needs to knock heads together in the Treasury and remove what the EAC politely describe as "a degree of institutional inertia".

More at the workshop at 12 o'clock on Saturday.

David Miliband, the new Secretary of State for the environment, interviewed in today's Observer:

- argues for emissions trading to cover aviation, stating "'If we have more flights, we have got to have less of something else";

- says that the premiership after Blair will be "Gordon's job". He further remarks that the Labour party is 'completely unified' about its future and 'completely unified in who the next leader of the party's going to be'.