In his speeach at the Labour Conference, David Miliband lays out his vision for environmental sustainability and argues that the environment embodies the party's mission of economic dynamism and social justice.

Tony Blair yesterday demanded that we show courage to tackle the challenges of the future.  Nowhere is that more true than on the environment. 

Al Gore says our government has been a world leader.  Let’s be proud of that.  But let us have the courage to say we have only begun the task of cutting carbon emissions.

Five months ago, when I started this job, I thought that I had a reasonable layman’s knowledge of the scale of the threat to our world.  20 weeks in this job have taught me I was kidding myself. 

The science is more alarming, the dangers far more immediate.  The risk is that we are sleepwalking towards catastrophe.

I’ve asked myself why there isn’t actually more concern.  And I wonder if it isn’t because we usually talk about the threat to our environment rather than the threat to ourselves and our children. 

30 000 people died in Europe from the heatwave of 2003.  That was our warning.  In our lifetimes, unless we act, 80 million people face the risk of flooding from rising sea levels.  Up to 600 million face the risk of famine.

People say there should be a debate about global warming.  But I tell you the debate is over; the reckoning has begun.  The truth is staring us in the face.  Climate change is here, in our country; it is an issue for our generation as well as future generations; and those who deny it are the flat earthers of the 21st century.

At the moment, we are living, Britons in the 21st century, as if there were three planets to support us when in fact we have only got one.    We are consuming the natural resources of three planets; burning the fossil fuel of three planets; pumping out enough carbon dioxide for three planets; yet we only have one planet to live on.

Of course it is a global problem.  The Americans consume far more. So soon will India and China.  But that is a reason to work harder rather than give in, negotiating abroad and taking action at home.

That is why today I propose we adopt a new goal as a country: to aim to live as a nation within the limits that the environment can tolerate, One Planet Living.

The challenge is immense.  But so are the tools at our disposal.  We know how to build the low carbon home, make the 150-200mpg car, deliver zero carbon energy. 

We can turn this from the burden of the century to the opportunity of the century.

Living within the limits of one planet is an opportunity to create a more competitive economy. 

With oil at $60 a barrel, every industry is going to have to be a green industry: every business improving its energy efficiency, every supermarket cutting its packaging and its waste, every Government department leading the drive for green procurement, every financier thinking about climate change in making investment decisions.

Living within the limits of one planet is an opportunity to improve quality of life: every housebuilder delivering the highest environmental standards, every householder benefiting from energy efficiency, and as Douglas will explain later every transport decision audited for its environmental consequences.

Living within the limits of one planet offers the opportunity for a renewal of British food and farming.

Our farmers can compete with the best in the world.  But my job is also to help British farmers cut food miles, nurture landscape and beauty, grow bio-fuels, and help us fight off the effects of climate change.

And living within the limits of one planet means a wholly different approach to energy efficiency and energy supply.  Here is one example. 

500 million watts of electricity is enough to serve the houses in Norwich and Oxford and Exeter and Newcastle combined.

Today I announce a radical scheme to deliver that amount of electricity. 

The Carbon Trust have explained to me that renewable energy, mainly wind power, on the land of local authorities and hospitals is currently held back because public and private investment is not working together. 

I am going to change that.  For a public investment of £10 million over two years, the Trust will unlock up to half a billion pounds of private investment, produce the 500 million watts of renewable electricity, and deliver clean energy to more than 250 000 homes and businesses around the country.

The Tories say they have gone green.  That must be why they have put that well-known environmentalist John Redwood in charge of developing economic policy.  Next it will be John Major advising on strong leadership…Jeffrey Archer leading the crusade for financial regulation.

I actually welcome Tory support for our ambitious targets; but it is the same David Cameron who has attacked wind turbines as “giant bird blenders”; I say you if you are for green living in theory but against wind power in practice then your promises are about as much use in the battle against climate change as bicycling to work with a chauffer-driven briefcase following behind you.

I think David Cameron should be warned: the British public are green not gullible.

The battle against climate change is an economic issue, a social issue, a security issue.  It is also a political issue.

Not who’s in and who’s out.  More important than that.  It is an issue about where power lies.

Last year at conference, I said we needed to give people more control over their lives.  I have changed jobs but I haven’t changed my mind. The truth is the balance of power in Britain is wrong today, and this affects the battle against climate change. 

The balance of power is wrong for individuals.  Nearly half of emissions come from homes and private transport, but people don’t know if they can make a difference.   Think of this:

-    one person half-filling their kettle when they have a cup of tea during the course of a year may not sound like much; but if a million people do, it would be the equivalent of taking 20 000 cars off the road

-    one family switching three light bulbs to low energy is hardly a revolution; but if a million people did it would be the equivalent of taking 100 000 cars off the road

-    cavity wall insulation costs about £150; at least that’s what I was quoted last Friday for my own home by the Energy Savings Trust; if a million of us have those walls filled it would be the equivalent of taking nearly 700 000 cars off the road. 

We need to be the radical thinkers about how to empower people – not just with information and incentives and regulations, all important ideas, but with the idea of a carbon card just like a credit card, charging us for our carbon emissions, rewarding us for our savings, and putting control in the hands of people.

The balance of power is wrong for local government too. And this is where we need to be bolder too. 

The world’s cities account for three quarters of emissions.  Labour Nottingham Council is leading the drive to sign up all local authorities to emissions reduction targets.  Our vision should be simple and bold: 100 great British cities driving our country forward.  They should trusted with the power and the politics to lead environmental change, driving forward sustainable housing, taking responsibility for congestion charging and improved public transport, heading the drive for new jobs and new wealth. That is a vision worth fighting for.

And the balance of power is not right at European level either.  We need to be honest here too. 

For my generation the second world war is important history but not vivid memory.  So Europe needs a new cause, and I believe the environment is that cause.  We need a stronger European Union on the environment, not a weaker one.

In the 21st century the EU should stand for two simple words: Environmental Union, driving down carbon emissions, negotiating international agreements, driving out energy inefficient products.  That’s a vision worth fighting for too.

In all these areas, the environment is not a diversion from our core mission of economic dynamism and social justice.  It embodies our core mission.

Let me put it this way.  Climate change is not just another issue for Labour in government.  It is a Labour issue. 

I don’t mean that we own it, or that we have a monopoly of wisdom about it.  I do mean that we have the values and the insights and the commitments that are needed to tackle it effectively.

The fight against climate change needs our Labour commitment to ensure those with power and wealth show responsibility and those who need help get it.  That is why we introduced the Climate Change Levy and have insulated one million homes under the Warm Front programme.

The fight against climate change needs our Labour understanding that markets without rules do not protect the things we value, whether the dignity of workers, the beauty of the countryside or the safety of the planet.  That is why it is right to lead the European drive to cap emissions from heavy industry and right to subsidise renewable energy. 

The fight against climate change needs our Labour belief in social justice. 

That is why I will be in Mexico next week and Kenya the month after arguing not just for international agreements to prevent climate change, but a carbon fund for Africa so that we are not just cutting poverty in Africa, not just tackling Aids in Africa, but for the first time protecting some of the poorest in the world from the terrible effects of today’s climate change.

Around the world progressive politics in the 20th century tackled the exploitation of people.  From health care to rights at work you can see the difference.  That is our social contract

In the 21st century we need that same spirit, that same energy, that same imagination and determination to tackle the exploitation of nature.  That must be our environmental contract – with each other and with future generations.

Success requires good policy.  But we also need a refreshed and energised Labour Party. 

Not refreshed by the cold war of opposition, but refreshed by ideas that are developed and tested by the heat of government.

Refreshed because we are not trapped by the fears of the 1980s.

Refreshed because we know there are new issues that need to be tackled in new ways.

Refreshed because we are determined to look outwards not inwards, open up the shutters, understand and serve the changing world around us. 

My generation was too young to fight the battles of the 1980s.  But I am old enough to know we had to learn the lessons of those years, about the economy, about crime, about staying in touch with the aspirations of the people we represent. 

But today those lessons are not enough. Tony said it.  Gordon said it.  The recipe from 1997 will not deliver for the problems of 2007, never mind 2017. 

Let’s understand our opportunity.

Twenty years ago, when I was a student, people said this was doomed to be a “conservative country” with a “conservative consensus”. 

That turned out to be wrong, for a simple reason. 

Many people, many of them in this hall, many sitting round the Cabinet table with me, kept up the fight and did not lose the faith.  Instead of winning only spasmodically, we learnt how to win consistently, and the real truth emerged.

Conservatism only wins in Britain when progressives stop thinking. In 1951, in 1970, in 1979, we stopped thinking, for various reasons, and lost.

So we need to be serious about what renewal means.

No government has invested more in the education system; but we need to think afresh about how we teach children when a three year old has the ingenuity and ability and technology to buy a car off e-Bay before he can read a book.

No government since 1960 has done more to cut child poverty or help parents; but we need to be the people championing a new approach to address new anxieties about work, family, community.

No government has overseen as big a fall in crime; but we need to rethink national security for an age of home-grown terrorism.

And while no government has made bigger constitutional change, let us recognise and address the fact that people care passionately about political issues but hate the way politics is done. 
The realities of the world have moved on from 1997.  The demands and opportunities of democratic power have moved on.  And so we must move on – our aims, our ideas, our way of doing politics.

The purpose is clear: not to abandon the progressive promise of New Labour, but to make sure it is sustained, deepened, modernised. 

So what if the challenges are huge.  So too are our reserves of hope and commitment.  So too are the energies and values of our country.

Our party has kicked the losing habit.  We taught ourselves a lesson, but in doing that we have demonstrated something else. 

It is that Britain is creative and not backward-looking, adaptable and not rigid, audacious and not daunted, progressive not conservative.

Three terms in government.  A different, better, fairer, richer country as a result.    And a world that needs progressive values.

Experience is our bedrock; idealism, optimism, energy, the new resources. 

Now is the time to be confident in our record; confident in our ideas; confident in our party and our country. 

Confident that a progressive consensus can be built.  Confident that we are the people, together, to build it.