The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Mrs Caroline Spelman)

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change and I represented the UK at the Environment Council in Luxembourg on 10 October. Stewart Stevenson, Scottish Minister for Environment and Climate Change, also joined the delegation.

Following lengthy debate, the Council adopted conclusions on preparations for the 17th session of the conference of the parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the seventh session of the meeting of the parties to the Kyoto protocol in Durban. The text signals the EU’s continued openness to a second commitment period of the Kyoto protocol as part of a transition to a wider legally binding framework, and sets out the EU’s negotiating position on the range of other issues in the negotiations.

Recently I attended the Delhi ministerial meeting on Rio plus 20. There was broad consensus that delegations have little appetite for simply agreeing a long-winded communiqué at Rio—they want action and implementation. The main outcomes of the Delhi meeting were: widespread agreement on the need for specific measures to make the transition to a greener global economy; recognition of the strong links between climate change, biodiversity and poverty reduction, and their importance for growth; agreement on the need to strengthen international environmental governance; and considerable interest in the Colombian proposal for sustainable development goals. Food security and sustainable agriculture, energy security and energy access, and resource efficiency were all identified as key themes for the Rio plus 20 summit.

The Aviation Emissions Trading Scheme was discussed under other business: the Commission encouraged member states to defend vigorously the legislation and counter some of the misunderstanding evident among others. The Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change agreed with their approach and reiterated the UK’s full support for the directive.

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