Empty seats and empty words at Paris Summit leave fossil fuel culprits off the hook

In response to the conclusion of the Summit, experts at Oil Change International said: 

On overall outcomes, Bronwen Tucker, Global Public Finance co-lead at Oil Change International said:
“Global leaders at the Paris Summit missed a critical opportunity to redirect trillions from fossil fuels, debt, and the ultra rich to address the climate crisis. Wealthy country leaders with both an outsized control over our global financial rules and institutions and an outsized responsibility for our global crises were largely absent. Those who did attend relied on old “we can’t pay for it” excuses, forwarding failed private-sector first approaches, and letting fossil culprits off the hook. Wealthy country leaders must listen to the advice over 150 economists gave at the start of this Summit: taxing extreme wealth, canceling public external debts in low income countries, ending fossil fuel handouts, and instead making the companies pay for their damages, would raise more than $3 trillion a year to slow the climate crisis. Looking ahead to COP28, the good news is that a growing contingent of Global South leaders are showing the way forward by building affordable renewable energy and holding their Northern peers accountable to pay their fair share.

On multilateral development banks (MDBs), Claire O’Manique, Global Public Finance Analyst at Oil Change International said:
“The World Bank Group was in the spotlight this week for its report calling on countries to end harmful fossil fuel subsidies and repurpose these funds to support climate solutions. The Bank must take its own advice— currently, it provides more public finance for fossil fuels than any other multilateral development bank, and it still pushes new fossil subsidies through development policy finance. As long as the World Bank Group and other multilateral development banks (MDBs) continue to pour more fuel on the fire, they cannot be trusted to deliver on the solutions needed to tackle the climate crisis.”

Notes: 

• Letter: 150+ economists and policy experts including Yanis Varoufakis, Jason Hickel, Olúfémi O. Táíwò, Nader Habibi, and Isabelle Ferreras call on Global North leaders to redirect over $3 trillion per year from fossils, debt, and the 1% to address global crises. (press release with expert quotes) 
• Briefing from Big Shift Global coalition detailing how the World Bank Group is subsidizing more fossil fuels than its peers. 
• Factsheet from Big Shift Global coalition on how continued fossil fuel support from MDBs is preventing them from being effective vehicles for global financial system transformation.
  
• Research by Oil Change International detailing that while many Global North countries are living up to their Glasgow commitment to end international public finance for fossil fuels, a small number of countries, including Germany, United States, and Italy are lagging behind and threatening this much-needed progress towards fossil free public finance as a global norm.