FT.com / Europe - Germany aims to capitalise on climate fears

FT.com / Europe - Germany aims to capitalise on climate fears

Germany aims to capitalise on climate fears
By Hugh Williamson in Berlin and George Parker in Brussels

Published: March 19 2007 19:19 | Last updated: March 19 2007 19:19

Germany wants to mobilise public concern over climate change to resolve another of the European Union’s trickiest problems: the relaunch of the bloc’s draft constitutional treaty.

Berlin, which holds the EU presidency, is working on ways to include the need for united action against global warming in proposals on the treaty, the Financial Times has learned.

The aim would be to give the treaty a populist push by tapping into an issue that has captured the imagination of people across Europe – regardless of national borders or political affiliation – to seek to demonstrate the relevance of the EU’s controversial new set of rules and institutions.

Frank-Walter Steinmeier, German foreign minister, alluded to Berlin’s plan in a recent speech arguing that “if we want to open this discussion [on revising the draft treaty] then climate protection is, in my view, the obvious candidate for an additional element”.

The comments were revealing as both Mr Steinmeier and chancellor Angela Merkel have otherwise stressed the need for keeping Berlin’s search for compromises on core elements of a new text out of the public eye.

The challenge of curbing climate change was also likely to feature in the “Berlin declaration”, to be signed on Sunday by EU leaders at the bloc’s 50th anniversary celebrations in the German capital, officials said.

Diplomats for other EU members said Berlin’s proposal was in line with efforts by governments and the European Commission to seize on “issues of the day” to win popular support. Europe’s current enthusiasm for tackling climate change is not reflected in this text, whose drafting began in 2002.

The EU decision this month to cut greenhouse gas emissions by a fifth from 1990 levels, plus a flurry of steps by member states – such as Britain’s climate change bill presented last week – “needed to be reflected” in Germany’s constitution plans, an official in Berlin said.

Ms Merkel has received plenty of advice on whether she should be using scissors or a pen to try to salvage the treaty when she makes proposals in June on achieving full ratification by 2009. Countries which have ratified the treaty, led by Spain, say she should take the original treaty and “improve” it, including a new section stressing Europe’s social dimension. Others have advocated taking out large sections of the original text to create a slimline treaty.

Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2007