Blair seeks climate change 'ingenuity'

Ingenuity and determination are needed to tackle climate change, Tony Blair has said.

Concluding a Friends of the Earth online debate on global warming, the prime minister said there was also a growing determination to take action.

"I believe strongly that just as human ingenuity has accidentally caused climate change, so the same ingenuity can help us undo the damage provided, of course, the will is there," he says in an article.

"I think here that the balance has shifted dramatically towards action in the last few years.

"The UK has played an important role in helping bring about the change but we need to do more - internationally, within Europe and at home."

FoE director Tony Juniper said the debate had provoked "an overwhelming response".

"While many people are supportive of the government's efforts to put climate change at the top of the international agenda, they are frustrated at the slow rate of progress in tackling the UK's own emission," he noted.

"A key way to address their concerns is for the government to ensure the Climate Change Bill, which was introduced in the Queen's speech, includes annual targets for cutting the UK's carbon dioxide emissions."