Ed Miliband: All financial institutions must form climate transition plans by 2023
Shadow business secretary Ed Miliband has urged the government to get all financial institutions to form credible climate transition plans by 2023.
The plans need to be consistent with the 2015 Paris Agreement which stipulated that to avoid climate disaster, the world must keep global temperature rises to 1.5C.
“London is one of the world’s financial centres. The UK may be one per cent of global emissions but according to Carbon Tracker, the investments of companies and financial institutions based in the City of London account for approximately 15 per cent of global emissions,” he said.
Speaking at an event held by the think tank Green Alliance, the Labour MP added: “Government should ask all financial institutions not just to report on climate risks, as they plan to, but to bring forward by 2023 credible transition plans that are consistent with a 1.5C pathway.
“This would make a profound difference in the flow of finance out of fossil fuels and into green energy.”
Miliband also turned his attention to FTSE 100 firms, urging that they too should be held to the same standard.
“We should ask all our FTSE 100 companies to do the same and have their own climate transition plans, consistent with 1.5C, by 2023. And furthermore, we should be asking in Glasgow that all major economies follow suit.”
It comes as the shadow business secretary called on prime minister Boris Johnson to “get off his sun lounger, be a statesman and make Glasgow the success we need it to be. This summit must succeed.”