Michael Meacher Quotations

We need a fundamental rethink of what we expect farming to produce,

We did fail last night. It is a tragedy, but it's a reversible tragedy and we will now put together those last final loose ends that we didn't have the time to do last night.

was signed up to by every single nation on earth, and if America now tries to walk away ... I think this is not just an environmental issue, it's an issue of transatlantic global foreign policy.

It will certainly be more localised, it will be less internationalised, less dependent on chemicals and fertilisers ... more organic.

It is the next two or three days that are vital,

It's a brilliant day for the environment. It's a huge leap to have achieved a result on this very complex international negotiation.

I think that will only really change when the human races begins to suffer some of the extremely severe consequences of climate change which may be some decades ahead. They will then realise, as we have with the financial crisis, that we are up against the wall and hitting the buffers and we have got to change.

I don't think we have learnt to keep within the limits. They are quite elastic but there is a point beyond which they will break and then you will get a complete and massive change in the climate in which the survival of human species might not be compatible.

Sustainable development: Holding our world in trust for our children

Forward thinking companies that adapt positively to the sustainable business agenda will be at the forefront of resource productivity, reducing waste and of environmental reporting. They and their management teams make things happen ahead of their competitors

This war on terror is bogus.

Globally, emissions may have to be reduced, the scientists are telling us, by as much as 60% or 70%, with developed countries likely to have to make even bigger cuts if we're going to allow the developing world to have their share of growing industrial prosperity...The Kyoto Protocol is only the first rather modest step. Much, much deeper emission reductions will be needed in future. The political implications are mind-blowing.

We have an overdraft with the earth something in excess of 130 per cent. We currently consume something like 30 per cent over and above what we are replacing and rather like an overdraft at a bank that can't go on.