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LONDON - Chancellor Gordon Brown will call on Monday local time for international action to tackle global warming and argue the best way to change people's behaviour is through education and incentives, not taxation.
In what aides are billing as major speech on the environment just months before he is widely expected to take over from Prime Minister Tony Blair, Brown will also propose the United Nations make dealing with climate change a core institutional "pillar".
But with just over a week to go until his annual budget, Brown looks unlikely to sanction any big rises in so-called "green" taxes as called for by some pressure groups.
He will argue that harnessing the desire of citizens and communities to play their part is the only way that carbon reductions can be achieved in a fair and just way.
"People want to make the right choices and they want help to take the right decisions. Government must provide practical help with, where ever possible, incentives in preference to penalties," he will say, according to Treasury officials.
"Changes must be considered, costed, credible and consumer friendly not ill-conceived, short-termist, unworkable and unfair."
Brown doubled air passenger duty and raised the tax on fuel in his pre-budget report in December but environmental groups said that fell short of what was needed. The Treasury argues that many green taxes are regressive and hit the poor.
The Conservative party, which is currently way ahead of Labour in the polls, said on Sunday that it was planning a range of taxes on air travel that could ration the number of flights people made before they were hit by taxes.
"Our plans will target dirtier planes and relatively wealthy people who fly often instead of package holidays," shadow chancellor George Osborne said in a statement.
Proposals are expected to include suggestions such as putting VAT or fuel duty on flights within the UK, or a per-flight tax on airlines. The Conservatives said any tax rises will be balanced with tax cuts in other areas.
But Brown will criticise the Conservatives' commitment to Europe and therefore international action.
"Euro-scepticism and continent-wide environmental action are at odds with each other," he will say. "A government ambivalent about the UK's future in Europe and allied to the most reactionary forces in the European Parliament would have no credibility, no influence and no achievements."
The government climate change bill will be published on Tuesday, setting a legal target of cutting carbon dioxide emissions by 60 per cent by 2050.
Brown will say that setting such targets will mean that the government will have to account for carbon emissions in the same disciplined way it must account for tax and spending decisions.
He will also set out a range of proposals to help people save energy in their homes and businesses.
- REUTERS
