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8 December 2010
Last updated at 14:36 ET
UK climate secretary Chris Huhne will not fly back to London from UN climate summit for a vote on student tuition fees, the BBC has learned.
Campaigners had warned the move could damage the process, as Mr Huhne has been tasked with brokering a compromise on the troubled Kyoto Protocol.
The coalition asked Labour to withdraw an MP from the ballot so Mr Huhne could stay, but the opposition declined.
Whether junior minister Greg Barker has to return is unclear at this stage.
In a statement on Wednesday, Mr Huhne said his party leader, Nick Clegg, agreed that it was important for him to remain in Mexico to "finish the vital work we have started".
"It is hugely regrettable that Ed Miliband's Labour Party has decided to put short-term political point scoring ahead of the long-term interests of the planet," Mr Huhne said.
"They are putting the next two days ahead of the next two generations."
Earlier, Meg Hillier, Labour's shadow energy and climate secretary, responded to criticism from campaigners by saying it was the government's decisions to hold the tuition fees vote now.
Continue reading the main story "It is a shame that Britain might be without a representative at the climate change talks because the coalition insist on rushing through legislation that is not fair, not necessary and not good for higher education," she said.
"The Lib Dems should realise we need ministers out there getting the best we can from Cancun. There are plenty of rebels within the Lib Dems that they could persuade to be paired-off against Chris Huhne."
'Car crash' concerns
However, in a speech during one of the plenary sessions at the conference, Mr Huhne turned his attention away from party politics in Westminster to the global issue of climate change.
He told delegates that a "car crash of a summit" was in no-one's interest.
"The answer has to be compromise," Mr Huhne urged.
"We cannot do everything here but we can make progress on mitigation, deforestation, adaptation, finance, reporting and more. And restore momentum to the global process - concrete steps to the treaty we want."
He added: "We believe that the future of the Kyoto Protocol is vital to the success of this process."
Mr Huhne, together with Brazil's environment minister Izabella Teixeira, were asked by the Mexican host government to find compromise ground over the Kyoto Protocol.
Japan said at the start of this meeting that it will not accept further emission cuts under the protocol. Their opposition is backed by Canada and Russia.
But developing countries are adamant that the protocol must continue.
It is seen as one of the key issues that must be resolved if there is to be any prospect of securing a new global climate deal.
Withering away
As the ministerial segment of this summit opened on Tuesday, the UN's top climate official Christiana Figueres had declared that time was running out for a deal.
"The political stakes are high because the effectiveness and credibility of your intergovernmental, multilateral process are in danger," she said.
"And the environmental stakes are high because we are quickly running out of time to safeguard our future.
"Tuvalu, The Maldives, Kiribati, Vanuatu are looking for ways of evacuating their entire populations because of salt water intrusion and sea level rise; their fate is a wake-up call to all of us."
Earlier, the UN Environment Programme (Unep) formally presented delegates with the results of a study published two weeks ago, showing that pledges on the table for curbing emissions will not be enough to keep the global average temperature rise below the levels that most governments say they want.
The vast majority of countries want to keep the rise within either 1.5C or 2C since pre-industrial times.
Lou Leonard from WWF was one of many environment campaigners emphasising that the agreement coming out of Cancun must allow for countries to increase their pledges, to close this gap.
"They say they want 2C, the pledges don't get to 2C - it's like the emperor has no clothes," he said.
The future of the Kyoto Protocol is just one of the issues dividing countries.
To facilitate compromise, the Mexican hosts have asked five pairs of ministers - one from a developing country, one from a developed - to explore particularly difficult areas.
They span emission cuts, adaptation to climate impacts, and the transfer of technology and money from rich to poor.
Mr Huhne agreed that the stakes were high; without movement here, he suggested, some governments would downgrade the importance they placed on the UN convention and its potential to deliver a meaningful climate pact.
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Campaigners had warned the move could damage the process, as Mr Huhne has been tasked with brokering a compromise on the troubled Kyoto Protocol.
The coalition asked Labour to withdraw an MP from the ballot so Mr Huhne could stay, but the opposition declined.
Whether junior minister Greg Barker has to return is unclear at this stage.
In a statement on Wednesday, Mr Huhne said his party leader, Nick Clegg, agreed that it was important for him to remain in Mexico to "finish the vital work we have started".
"It is hugely regrettable that Ed Miliband's Labour Party has decided to put short-term political point scoring ahead of the long-term interests of the planet," Mr Huhne said.
"They are putting the next two days ahead of the next two generations."
Earlier, Meg Hillier, Labour's shadow energy and climate secretary, responded to criticism from campaigners by saying it was the government's decisions to hold the tuition fees vote now.
Continue reading the main story "It is a shame that Britain might be without a representative at the climate change talks because the coalition insist on rushing through legislation that is not fair, not necessary and not good for higher education," she said.
"The Lib Dems should realise we need ministers out there getting the best we can from Cancun. There are plenty of rebels within the Lib Dems that they could persuade to be paired-off against Chris Huhne."
'Car crash' concerns
However, in a speech during one of the plenary sessions at the conference, Mr Huhne turned his attention away from party politics in Westminster to the global issue of climate change.
He told delegates that a "car crash of a summit" was in no-one's interest.
"The answer has to be compromise," Mr Huhne urged.
"We cannot do everything here but we can make progress on mitigation, deforestation, adaptation, finance, reporting and more. And restore momentum to the global process - concrete steps to the treaty we want."
He added: "We believe that the future of the Kyoto Protocol is vital to the success of this process."
Mr Huhne, together with Brazil's environment minister Izabella Teixeira, were asked by the Mexican host government to find compromise ground over the Kyoto Protocol.
Japan said at the start of this meeting that it will not accept further emission cuts under the protocol. Their opposition is backed by Canada and Russia.
But developing countries are adamant that the protocol must continue.
It is seen as one of the key issues that must be resolved if there is to be any prospect of securing a new global climate deal.
Withering away
As the ministerial segment of this summit opened on Tuesday, the UN's top climate official Christiana Figueres had declared that time was running out for a deal.
"The political stakes are high because the effectiveness and credibility of your intergovernmental, multilateral process are in danger," she said.
"And the environmental stakes are high because we are quickly running out of time to safeguard our future.
"Tuvalu, The Maldives, Kiribati, Vanuatu are looking for ways of evacuating their entire populations because of salt water intrusion and sea level rise; their fate is a wake-up call to all of us."
Earlier, the UN Environment Programme (Unep) formally presented delegates with the results of a study published two weeks ago, showing that pledges on the table for curbing emissions will not be enough to keep the global average temperature rise below the levels that most governments say they want.
The vast majority of countries want to keep the rise within either 1.5C or 2C since pre-industrial times.
Lou Leonard from WWF was one of many environment campaigners emphasising that the agreement coming out of Cancun must allow for countries to increase their pledges, to close this gap.
"They say they want 2C, the pledges don't get to 2C - it's like the emperor has no clothes," he said.
The future of the Kyoto Protocol is just one of the issues dividing countries.
To facilitate compromise, the Mexican hosts have asked five pairs of ministers - one from a developing country, one from a developed - to explore particularly difficult areas.
They span emission cuts, adaptation to climate impacts, and the transfer of technology and money from rich to poor.
Mr Huhne agreed that the stakes were high; without movement here, he suggested, some governments would downgrade the importance they placed on the UN convention and its potential to deliver a meaningful climate pact.
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