E3G

BBC Radio 4: G8 Summit Analysis

By Chris Littlecott

[04.27] Edward Stourton: John Ashton, what do you make of this communique?

John Ashton: Well, I think it is certainly not a step backwards and there was a real danger in this process that it could have taken a step backwards, but nor it is a breakthrough.

It is probably useful to have the text, more useful it has probably been to have heads of government and their personal representatives talking about this subject for a year just in terms of raising awareness, but I think what really matters, and the real test of this text, is what is going to happen next.

The most interesting thing about the Gleneagles outcomes is the contrast between the debate on Africa, which is a real debate about large sums of money – about what investment you need to make poverty history – and the debate on climate, which is really been words.

We have words on paper in the climate communique and I think the opportunity now is to try to build on this communique and get this into an investment debate about how you can put 50 billion extra dollars of investment into climate, as we have just decided to do on Africa, and what we are going to get for that.

ES: As a format diplomat what’s your view of this question of whether it was right to sign up to something which is perhaps a bit weaker than many of the countries want, or whether it would have been better to try and back America into a corner?

JA: Well, I have some sympathy with the view that David Hawkins has just put. But, I also think in a way its a secondary question…

ES: Bryan Hoskins?

JA: No, David Hawkins, from the report, in Roger Harrabin’s report.

ES: In the report, yes, I beg your pardon.

JA: But I also think in a way it is a secondary question. I think, as I say, the key issue is what happens next. As far as America is concerned, in the end, it will be Americans who persuade the American administration to move, not other countries, not even I suspect G8 leaders.

[Questions to Brian Hoskins on what happens next and the value of the G8 as an international forum.]