Speech COP27 Klimaattop

Van 12 tot en met 18 november neemt Tweede Kamerlid Agnes Mulder neemt deel aan de COP27, ook wel bekend als de klimaattop, in Sharm El Sheikh (Egypte). Op 13 november heeft ze de Parliamentary Meeting van de Inter-Parlementaire Unie toegesproken over het belang van klimaatbeleid.

Lees haar speech hieronder.

Honourable Chair, Fellow Parliamentarians, Ladies and gentlemen here present at the Parliamentary meeting on the occasion of the 27th United Nations Climate Conference
 
Coming from a country with a Delta, The Netherlands is very well awareof the effects of global warming on our country and on all of our countries.
 
Since the Paris Agreement, a lot has happened and a lot still needs to be done.
 
As a member of the Twelve plus group, I have been active in the Standing committee on Sustainable Development.
 
Chairing this committee is a great honour for me and we had a good session at our last IPU meeting in Rwanda. We had an informal meeting where we exchanged information. We addressed how we can learn from the good and bad experiences of our colleagues from other parliaments. The most important thing I remember from this meeting was the commitment one could feel in the room to make changes for the better for the people of your respective countries, especially concerning theconsequences for families of the flooding in our respective countries. And although we cannot be totally sure that climate change was the cause in these examples, we do know that climate change will lead to more floodings in the future. 
 
As a member of the Dutch parliament, I have been the spokesperson on Climate policy for my party the last couple of years.

Currently I chair the standing committee on Economic Affairs and Climate Policy in our Parliament and I am the spokesperson on Foreign Affairs, Mining and Circular Economy.
 
The Netherlands supported the proposal to increase the CO2 reduction goal in Europe from 40% to 55%.
 
Thanks to the pressure of many national parliaments in Europe and the European Parliament this goal of 55% CO2 reduction in 2030 is now agreed upon in Europe and became law.
 
The European Commission started to implement the European Green Deal.
 
A number of important legislative proposals have already be agreed upon by the European co-legislators, represented in the European parliament and the European Union countries. These are the Effort Sharing regulation, which sets national targets for emission reductions for road transport, heating of buildings, agriculture, small industrial installations and waste management. This new EU-law, regulates roughly 60% of EU emissions.The second one is LULUCF, which sets out rules for carbon removal and increases the EU carbon sinks target for the land use and forestry sector.

In the Netherlands we already have a national Climate Law as well.
The initiative for this Climate Law came from opposition parties in parliament and gradually gained the support of the coalition parties. This climate law is currently being revised to comply with higher ambitions. 
 
Europe is responsible for 8 per cent of the Global CO2 emissions.
 
In Europe we know that we cannot make the change alone. All countries in the world need each other to achieve the goals in the Paris Agreement.
 
I call upon all nations to act accordingly if we want to keep the 1,5degrees within reach.
 
We only have one world.

Many of the youth protest loud and clear on the streets of Europe and we invited them in Parliament to have an open dialogue. In our parliamentwe have the right to hand over petitions and this week we received a petition from high school children who are concerned about their own future and of the future of other children all around the globe. They asked us to tell the world that they care. And they made us promise to report back to them when we return from the COP. 
 
This is about their and our future.
 
As The Netherlands did not do enough we need to step up our investments in clean energy, reducing CO2 emissions and make our economy a circular economy.
 
Value chains are global and international corporate social responsibility crosses our borders.
 
We need to be clear as parliaments in what we ask from our companies and not compete with each other at the cost of the workers.

In the upcoming years, the Netherlands will invest approximately 35 billion Euros to reach the goals of the Paris agreement. We have made a National Agreement next to the Paris Agreement. 5 sectors need tocontribute in order to reach our goals. These are the Industry, the Energy sector, the Mobility sector, the housing and other buildings sector and the Agricultural sector. 

For our citizens it is really important what is happening in our neighbourhoods. Because in a way we are reshaping our living environment. This has a huge impact on all of us. That is why we have so called Regional Energy Strategies. We try to establish regional and local agreements on where to put Wind turbines or solar fields. We are practising with Climate deliberation panels to involve our citizens. It is not easy but it is necessary. We need to share the burden and the benefits of the climate and energy transition.

The war that Russia started in Ukraine created a shortage in energy and food worldwide. The effects of this are felt hardest by the poorest people. 

For us it makes it very clear that we need to diversify sources of energy and that they need to be more of the renewable kind as well. Too much dependency is never a good thing. We should base our cooperation with each other on reciprocity. And we want our countries to be resilient.

Therefore, I think that countries should make more effort in sharing their knowledge with countries that are in need of that knowledge. These climate adaptation measures can really help in preventing more loss and damage. The Netherlands will increase its commitment to International climate financing from 581 to 900 million euros, of which half is allocatedfor climate adaptation, and the other half for climate mitigation. Together with private sector financing this will add up to 1.8 billion euros in 2025. NGO’s recognize the fact that a majority of these are grants, and not loans. We believe that this contribution is a fair share for the Netherlands. 
 
This transformation is not a technical transformation, it will affect each and every one of us in the way we use mobility, we warm or cool our homes, the way in which we work.
 
Instead of judging each other we should be helping each other.
 
We should make better monitoring agreements.
 
As Western countries we should deliver what we promised.
 
Our Parliament checks whether our ministers deliver or not. We have debates on climate change in our parliament regularly.
 
These debates are on adaptation measures and mitigating plans and how they should be financed.
 
Together with our industry we want to make the change happen. We see the employees of the companies stepping up and that is a good sign. People want to work for companies that make a positive impact on our world today. Parliaments should give clear directions in norms that the companies should meet.
 
These norms need to exist worldwide otherwise the change will not happen. We urge our colleagues to join us. We should have an open discussion in the coming years on how we can improve our efforts because we will make mistakes and things will go wrong, but as we learnwe will become stronger and resilient and change the world for the better.
 
Together all of us can be the change. That change starts with an open dialogue as the one that we are having here today and also if you have time to join us at Benelux-EIB Pavillion here in Sharm El-Sheik or online tomorrow afternoon. Our colleague William Waver from the Seychelles is our guest speaker and our minister of Climate and Energy mister Rob Jetten will be willing to talk to you as well as the Head of the Cabinet of Frans Timmermans mister Diederik Samsom of the European Commission. By organizing this event we want to reach out to you. 
 
I wish all of us the wisdom and courage in our difficult task to keep the Paris goals within reach.