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Colleagues, can I start the meeting
and begin by welcoming you.
Thank you all for coming here.
It's very good to see you in London,
and I hope in the next couple of days we will make progress
in our very important discussions,
50 days, now, from the Copenhagen summit.
I think that it is very important
that in Copenhagen
we can find a formula
to organise the finance
to help to build a neutral-carbon economy in the long term.
To be fair in terms of how to distribute the efforts to mitigate,
and to be fair also in terms of how to build a resilience
for those who are especially vulnerable
to resist climate change impact.
And I think that we have everything we need.
Adaptation is the key word
for us least-developed countries.
And adaptation equals development, support for development,
and not punishment or penalty for the developed countries
for the mistakes of the past,
because those were not conscious mistakes.
So they shouldn't be beaten with a big stick.
Rather, they should assist us to change the strategy
and not fall into the same pitfalls that they went through.
Business will be behind anything
that is clear and stable.
Because in the end they will be rational.
It is up to the people in Copenhagen
to think of values and the irrational -
the real deep understandings
of what to do with this generation and the next generations.
And business will have to respond in a rational way,
provided that the systems are set up
to make it possible for them to do that.
Despite this being an incredibly tough thing to do -
after all, the world is trying to do
what has never been done before,
which is to find a way, through a series of actions and commitments
from developing and developed countries,
to turn round the inexorable rise in global emissions.
That's, in a way, the most important thing
that we could have come out of Copenhagen.
Despite the toughness of the task,
there are more reasons for optimism than people give credit for.
And the reasons for optimism are many of the people in this room,
from developing countries and from developed countries,
who have been taking notice of the very important deadline of December
and Copenhagen.
What's very important about this issue
is that we know it is crucially an environmental issue,
but it is not just an environmental issue.
It's an economic issue, it's a social policy issue
and it's a foreign policy issue as well.
That's one of the many reasons why we thought it was a good idea
to have David Miliband with us this evening. Thank you.
Thank you very much
for giving me the honour of hosting
this important reception here.
Of the many important meetings that have been held here over many years,
I think that this could turn out to be one of the most important.
You are engaged in
one of the most complex multilateral pieces of negotiation
attempted for a very long time.
But you're also engaged in a piece of multilateral diplomacy
that hundreds of millions of people around the world understand.
And they will understand
if at the end of this process there is success or if there is failure.
And I believe that the consequences of failure
for international faith in the multilateral system,
in the ability of the international system
to come to grips with difficult issues and resolve them,
will be shaken to its foundations
if the Copenhagen summit is not a success.
And so the consequences of the next 50 days' activity
are vital for what we all believe is a critical issue
for ourselves, our children and our grandchildren.
But it's also very important for the ability of the international system,
in an increasingly interdependent world, to do its business.
Because I think one of the most interesting things
about the debate about climate change mitigation and adaptation
is that it is emblematic and symptomatic
of a new reality in foreign policy.
And that is that if you want to make change
you don't just need governments to get agreements.
You need governments, markets and citizens
to be lined up behind a shared set of goals
and a shared set of programmes.
The values of social justice, the values of mutual responsibility
and the values of internationalism
are not values that are owned by one particular part of the world.
They're not owned by one country or one continent,
they're actually values that are practised as well as preached
in all the continents of the world.
And I hope you will vow with me that you'll use every day
between now and the Copenhagen conference, the Copenhagen summit,
to make it a success. Thank you very much indeed.
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