Tony Blair is today criticised by a group of scientists and diplomats for failing to use Britain's "special relationship" with the US to put pressure on George Bush to ratify the Kyoto protocol.

The intervention is made by peers on the cross-party House of Lords science and technology committee.

Interviewed in the Guardian, enviroment secretary Margaret Beckett says: "We're always talking to Gordon about the things he'd be prepared to do this time round ... He does a bit more for the environment every Budget."