“If we go bankrupt, no one will care about the natural environment in the world anymore,” Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said last week in Strasbourg.
The European People’s Party (EPP) will not join forces with French far-right leader Jordan Bardella to temporarily suspend the EU’s landmark Green Deal, the centre-right chair of the European Parliament’s environment committee said on Tuesday.
“To Bardella, I would just say no. We have a completely different vision (on the Green Deal),” MEP Peter Liese (Germany/EPP) said at a press conference on Tuesday, emphasizing that climate targets are central to the bloc’s strategy for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
Bardella, the head of the European Parliament’s far-right Patriots for Europe group and president of Marine Le Pen’s National Rally, sent a letter dated 28 January to the EPP, the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), and the European Sovereign Nations (ESN) groups in Parliament. In it, he urged them to form an alternative alliance against the left to scale back measures aimed at making the EU climate-neutral by 2050.
“It is imperative that Parliament take swift, massive and concrete action to protect our companies, our citizens and our future,” Bardella wrote to the right-wing groups. He argued that temporarily suspending the Green Deal would allow for a re-evaluation of its objectives and implementation “without destroying the prospects of prosperity for our continent.”
The Patriots’ rejection of the Green Deal aligns with their long-held position. However, Bardella is attempting to capitalize on recent remarks by Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk in the Strasbourg plenary, calling for a “full and very critical” review of the EU’s Green Deal.
“If we go bankrupt, no one will care about the world’s environment anymore,” EPP-affiliated Tusk said last week, advocating for an honest review of all legislation, including measures under the Green Deal.
While the EPP has previously cooperated with far-right forces in the Parliament to push back against certain environmental policies, Liese has dismissed the idea of stopping the Green Deal.
The EPP ENVI chairman told Euronews that the centre-right group supports the initiative of the Commission for a Competitiveness Compass to cut red tape and boost competitiveness.
However, “we want to safeguard the core of the Green Deal, in particular the climate target. That’s why we refuse Mr. Bardella’s initiative on the content,” Liese said.
“We do not support proposals by the Patriots, but rather our one hundred percent EPP line or reasonable compromises with the pro-European groups in the European Parliament,” he added.
Still, Bardella is appealing to the right-wing groups of the Parliament to support a future debate on the temporary suspension of the Green Deal, alongside a resolution that would be put to a vote by MEPs.
“In this way, we can send a clear and unequivocal message within our Parliament, in favour of a pragmatic and realistic environmental ambition in the face of the challenges we face,” Bardella concluded.
Vincenzo Genovese contributed to this story.
The story was updated to include more comments from Peter Liese.
Read the full article here
