The Catholic Archbishop of Sydney, Cardinal George Pell, has questioned the cost benefits of financing action to curb climate change, such as funding clean, renewable energy. Speaking at the annual lecture of the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF), a climate sceptic think tank he said “The cost of attempts to make global warming go away will be very heavy. They may be levied initially on ‘the big polluters’ but they will eventually trickle down to the end-users”.
It was only under questioning from the audience in Westminster Cathedral Hall that Cardinal Pell made clear that he was speaking as an individual and not presenting an official Catholic stance.
When told of a 2007 gathering of all the parishes in the Archdiocese of Manila to discuss climate change mitigation as well as adaptation, he responded that he felt the thousands of people present were “mistaken”.
In the same week at a meeting of 48 small island and developing nations in Perth, which took place before the recent meeting of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM), South Pacific, African and Caribbean states said big greenhouse gas emitters China and the United States were dragging their feet on tackling climate change and urged a Commonwealth leaders summit this week to call for urgent action at global climate talks in November.
“The scientific evidence available to us says we ought to act now,” said Samoan Prime Minister Tuilaepa Malielegaoi after a meeting of 48 small island and developing nations in Perth last week.
Reports say that Climate Change and food security were two of the issues topping the agenda at the CHOGM meeting.
With many of the Commonwealth nations being low-lying islands, CHOGM agreed on a slew of measures to promote action on climate change, including a push to find better ways to fund mitigation and adaptation projects. The Five Commonwealth members, who are also members of the G-20, will argue the case of the small island states at next month’s G-20 summit in Cannes.
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