Tackling climate change has dominated the European Union agenda for much of the past five years. I and the ECR group share the majority’s concern regarding climate change and its effects, and we agree that the EU must achieve a carbon-neutral economy. At the same time, however, we are also concerned by news that growth in the Union has stagnated, especially since this stagnation is happening during what is proving to be a geopolitical showdown between the West and Russia and its allies.
During the 1980s, the West’s ability to outgrow the countries behind the iron curtain was key to its victory in the cold war, with the Soviet Union collapsing once it could no longer keep up the pace. There is no doubt that that maintaining high economic growth will prove decisive in winning this current showdown as well, and that the consequences for humanity if we lose will be more dire than any natural disaster.
To achieve the economic growth needed to defeat the totalitarian powers of the world while at the same time creating a sustainable economy, the ECR believe that the EU needs a more pragmatic approach to the climate transition.
First, technology neutrality must be a cornerstone. Policymakers risk inadvertently stifling innovation when they declare one particular technology (for example, wind power) to be ‘the future’, or that another (such as nuclear power) must be phased out. The EU should refrain from such favouritism, and rather than attempting to pick winners and losers, it should only set overarching goals while leaving room for the member states and their private sectors to adapt and innovate as they see fit to reach these goals.
Without resilient rural areas, European supply chains – especially agricultural supply chains – risk being disrupted
Secondly, we need to protect international trade relations. While well intentioned, the introduction of the carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) would make the EU a less attractive trading partner at a time when the West desperately needs to prevent its allies in the developing world from falling into Russia’s sphere of influence. It would also increase the cost of materials such as cement, iron and steel used in construction – costs that would then be passed on to European consumers through more expensive housing.
Finally, we must protect rural areas. Without resilient rural areas, European supply chains – especially agricultural supply chains – risk being disrupted. If the transition leads to food insecurity in unpredictable crises, the EU could suffer. The importance of protecting rural areas from everything from energy and fuel poverty to wolves and other predators plaguing livestock farmers cannot be underestimated.
Politics, in its essence, is about priorities. European voters expect us to balance environmental and economic priorities in a way that will protect both the climate and their wallets. Both I and the ECR group stand ready to work with the other groups to achieve a better balance over the next five years.