The Spanish government has urged Rishi Sunak to demonstrate a clear commitment to the fight against the climate emergency, calling the British government’s standoff over the prime minister’s attendance at the upcoming summit “sad” and “surprising” of Cop27, given the global reputation and the reputation of the United Kingdom. his current presidency of the conference.
Spain’s Environment Minister Teresa Ribera also said the “absurd” and dragging political debate on climate change in the UK was “surprising and disappointing”.
Speaking to the Guardian ahead of this year’s summit in Sharm el-Sheikh, the minister said Europe needed to be strategic, transparent and decisive, particularly after a report found temperatures on the continent have risen more than double the world average in the last 30 years.
Ribera, who is one of Spain’s three deputy prime ministers, also insisted that the UK has an important role to play in tackling the climate emergency. She noted that the country still retains the presidency of the COP after last year’s summit, and said she had been puzzled by Sunak’s initial refusal to attend the conference and the British government’s decision to request that King Charles not attend the talks.
“I was very surprised,” he said. “I think there has been a lot of commentary on social media, but it must be remembered that the UK still holds the presidency of one of the most important multilateral forums of the UN, a forum which is called upon to respond to global challenges.
“And it is surprising that they limited the presence of the head of state and questioned the presence of the prime minister. Given what the UK has been for so long when it comes to analyzing global problems and proposing global solutions, it is very sad to see this debate.”
While Ribera welcomed Sunak’s attendance, he said he hoped it would be more than a “symbolic step” and would be accompanied by meaningful policies.
“What matters is the domestic action, and I think this is another of the lessons we have seen with the election of Lula. [Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the new president] in Brazil now and with the elections in Australia [won by Labor] and in so many other places,” he said. “The fight against climate change is not ordered to the police, but to the ballot boxes of each and every country. And I think it’s important that the British Prime Minister makes it clear that his commitment is what we expect from a country like the United Kingdom.”
Regardless of which party was in power in the UK, he added, the government “cannot afford to fall on the same side as the [climate crisis] denyers or delays”. Ribera acknowledged that Sunak had not won office through a general election, but noted that the downfall of his two predecessors “had a lot to do” with how they had addressed social issues.
The minister, an environmental veteran who was Spain’s secretary of state for climate change between 2008 and 2011, admitted it was difficult to explain the injustice, inequality and suffering caused by not dealing with the climate emergency, as well as breaking old habits.
“But while it’s one thing for these inertias and tensions to be normal, I expect a lot more from those of us in a position to facilitate decisions,” he said.
“The important thing is how we react to this turbulence… That’s why it’s surprising and disappointing that you have this absurd debate in the UK. That’s why it’s surprising and disappointing that people still talk about things in such a retarded and very selfish way. It shows that there are many people who have not understood anything, or who deliberately want to hide what [climate] change media.”
Ribera said Spain’s recent summer of record temperatures and devastating forest fires had been “a very significant jolt” to public opinion.
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“I think people are realizing that climate change is not something that is far away in time or space,” he said. “That it’s not just something for polar bears or their great-grandchildren. We live with it and it’s affecting us in a much more cross-cutting way than the average citizen previously imagined.”
Ribera said he hopes that Spain, the European country most threatened by desertification, can act as a bridge to countries in the Sahel and Central America that are already experiencing problems with water, food security and loss of soil quality. He also said the international community needed to stop ignoring “the big elephant in the room” and do more to anticipate foreseeable disasters in the coming decades.
“Obviously, drought, desertification and poverty mean tension, conflict and migration or Boko Haram,” he said. “There are problems that we still have time to address, if we take adaptation policies and financing seriously. I say policies because it’s not just about money. There needs to be capacity to use these resources.”
If world leaders were to commit to mitigating the worst ravages of the climate emergency, Ribera said, they needed to be clear, calm, decisive and persuasive.
“It’s vital to be very transparent with the explanations, but also very decisive about how we solve these problems,” he said. “We can’t rely only on impacting people because if you do that, the reaction is: ‘Carpe diem’. And we can’t be satisfied only with ideas in the medium and long term: we also have to be very determined in the short term”.