Labour's Russian Wake-Up Call

Thursday 20 May 2004

Ken Shirley Press Releases - Environment & Conservation

Russia's forceful rejection of the Kyoto Protocol must surely serve as a wake-up call to the New Zealand Labour Government, ACT New Zealand Deputy Leader and Environment Spokesman Ken Shirley said today.

"In an address to London's Adam Smith Institute's Energy Policy Unit this week, Andrei Illarionov - Chief Advisor to President Putin - stated that Kyoto-ism is incompatible with economic growth, good environmental outcomes and human rights," Mr Shirley said.

"Calling Kyoto `another example of totalitarian ideology like Marxism, communism and socialism', Mr Illarionov predicted that Kyoto-ism would lead to the creation of bureaucratic monsters at national and supra-national levels. He also went on to describe the science behind Kyoto as `deeply flawed'.

"Earlier this month Russia's Academy of Sciences concluded that the Kyoto Protocol has `no scientific foundation'. The Academy observed that the Protocol does not achieve the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change's goals and that it would, in fact, be economically harmful to Russia and global development generally.

"Mr Illarionov rightly pointed out that the strong link between wealth creation and environmental protection. Kyoto harms economic growth, perpetuates poverty and would undermine everyone's ability to achieve a cleaner, healthier environment. He concluded that the most important policy for environment protection is creating the right conditions for economic growth. Kyoto has the opposite effect and is therefore environmentally harmful.

"The New Zealand Government's excessive enthusiasm in ratifying the Kyoto Protocol has now been exposed as extreme folly for all the world to see," Mr Shirley said.

ENDS

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