Roger Helmer, on behalf of the EFD Group. – Mr President, Mr Tatarella has told us that recent decades have become warmer. But that is exactly the pattern we saw a thousand years ago before the medieval warm period; we saw it two thousand years ago before the Roman optimum; we saw it three thousand years ago before the Minoan optimum, and in none of those cases was there a tipping point. In none of those cases was there a disaster. We are dealing here with well-understood, long-term natural climate cycles which have been in place for many thousands of years.

Our problem is not with the climate but with our climate policy. Yesterday I attended a briefing by Euroelectric and Eurostat on energy statistics. We heard that the EU’s emissions were flat in 2012 and are expected to increase in 2013 – this despite vast investments in green infrastructure, specifically in renewable energy projects. If emissions increase despite our best efforts when the economy is struggling, what will happen if the Eurozone ever recovers? I will tell you: emissions will rise. Colleagues, this must surely be the most expensive failure in history. Hundreds of billions of euros of investment, yet no progress towards our emissions objectives.

This is recognised not just by me, my party and my group, but by the Commission. We had energy Commissioner Gunther Oettinger telling us that Europe could not afford to pursue a unilateral climate policy. We had Industry Commissioner Antonio Tajani telling us that Europe faced an industrial massacre as a result of energy prices. This is the damage that we are doing.

A recent study by respected environmental economist Bjørn Lomborg showed that Germany's vast USD 130 billion investment in solar PV will have the effect, by the end of this century, of delaying the progress of global warming by 37 hours! We have seen less than one degree of warming in the last hundred years. We have seen none for nearly 20 years. A delay of 37 hours is effectively zero. That is USD 130 billion for nothing. It is time to stop this folly.