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NEWS RELEASE
Thursday 1st February 2007
IPCC's Damning Conclusions on Climate Change:
Will Scottish political parties now take action?
The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)
will tomorrow (Friday 2nd February) release its long-anticipated 'Fourth
Assessment Report'. This will provide the most compelling evidence yet
of the human cause of climate change and its devastating impacts.
TRANSform Scotland, the national sustainable transport alliance, have
today called for all Scottish parties to demonstrate in their election
manifestos how they will make deep cuts in greenhouse gas emissions from
the Scottish transport sector.
Transport is one of the main contributors to climate change. Yet despite
widespread agreement on the need to take decisive action on this issue,
there is little evidence that the Scottish transport sector is taking
measures to reduce emissions: car use and road freight levels continue
to increase, air travel growth is uncontrolled, while vehicle efficiency
is failing to make significant improvement.
Colin Howden, Director of TRANSform Scotland, said:
"The Scottish Executive has fallen far short on the action needed
to reduce transport's impact on the environment. From throwing subsidies
at airline companies to bulldozing through new motorways, their performance
remains poor.
"Even more disturbingly, the Executive's agenda has faced little
or no effective scrutiny in the Scottish Parliament - with the major opposition
parties, the SNP and the Tories, advocating an even more irresponsible
set of policies.
"In light of the IPCC's damning conclusions, urgent action is needed
in the Scottish transport sector in order to reduce its emissions. Unfortunately,
there is so far little evidence that the Scottish political class have
the gumption to take up this challenge.
"It will be interesting to see whether any of the major Scottish
political parties are prepared to set out in their election manifestos
credible programmes for reducing greenhouse gas emissions from transport.
So far, all they seem capable of is pandering to greedy and unsustainable
demands for cheaper travel and more roads and airports."
ENDS
NOTES TO EDITORS:
[1] TRANSform Scotland
TRANSform Scotland is the national sustainable transport alliance, bringing
together rail, bus and shipping operators, local authorities, national
environment and conservation groups, businesses and local transport groups.
We can be contacted at Lamb's House, Burgess Street, Leith, Edinburgh,
EH6 6RD. Tel 0131 467 7714; fax 0131 554 8656; email <info@transformscotland.org.uk>;
web <http://www.transformscotland.org.uk>.
[2] Further information
Our detailed briefing (published on 01/02/07) is available as a PDF at
<http://www.transformscotland.org.uk/info/docs/2007-02-01_IPCC_report.pdf>
END OF NEWS RELEASE
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