The climate crisis is not something coming in a few decades, but is already here, Metz wrote on Facebook this week. Speaking on RTL Radio on Friday, she said the ongoing heatwave and record-breaking temperatures in Luxembourg were further evidence that the climate crisis is not a distant threat but an urgent reality. Extreme weather events, she noted, are now more frequent and more severe across Europe.
Metz underscored that heatwaves are becoming longer and more intense, explaining that the trend is already producing serious health consequences and that the situation is a public health crisis.
She pointed to the rise in heat-related deaths and the strain on infrastructure and public services, citing figures from the World Health Organisation, which she said clearly states that 200,000 people have died as a result of extreme heat conditions in Europe over the past four years.
Those deaths, Metz argued, could have been avoided had the right political decisions been taken. She called for a halt to what she described as the massive deregulation of environmental standards and for governments to coordinate and put concrete measures in place. Policymakers, she insisted, know exactly what needs to be done, and that, she said, was the good news.
Metz did not hide her frustration with the conservatives in the European Parliament during Friday morning's RTL interview, telling RTL the situation made her very angry and very disappointed. Two issues, she said, were currently in focus, namely climate policy and the new asylum and migration package, on both of which the conservatives were, in her view, walking an inhumane path alongside the far right and watering down climate goals in the process.
The science is clear, Metz said, with heatwaves like the current one set to become more frequent and more intense, putting health and infrastructure under growing pressure. Adjustments in daily life are of course warranted, she added, but in her view the priority should be to stop the massive deregulation currently being pushed through by the conservatives and far right. EU member states, she warned, are now considering rolling back climate targets and limits on deforestation. The ban on new combustion engines has already been lifted, and these days, she said, anyone who talks about the Green Deal is dismissed as an ideologue.
Asked whether the EU did not need a strong economy in order to compete with the US and China, the Green MEP rejected what she called "silo thinking". The idea that the environment and climate change have nothing to do with the economy, she said, simply did not hold.
The immense consequences of climate change, Metz argued, have a direct impact on the economy, and both go hand in hand with social justice, since it is people who are physically and economically vulnerable who tend to be hit hardest. The MEP underlined that companies investing in decarbonisation would also prove the most resilient over time. She pointed to China as an example, where massive investment has long been channelled into electromobility and renewables.
Metz then turned to the new asylum and migration package, approved by the European Parliament last week largely thanks to votes from the right and the far right, calling it a fundamental attack on human rights. More specifically, she pointed to the return of people without a residence permit to third countries. People could now be transferred to countries to which they have no real connection, she said, and individuals, including minors, could be detained or have their mobile phones confiscated and data stolen.
A number of Social Democrat and two Green MEPs also voted in favour of the new system. Metz said she had not spoken to them and could not understand their vote, though she speculated that domestic political considerations in their own countries might be part of the picture. In any case, she described it as a scandal, and said it was even more scandalous that some MEPs had been heard shouting "send them back" after the vote in the European Parliament. She called the new rules a European ICE system à la Donald Trump.
She pointed to an appeal by 200 NGOs urging that the changes to asylum and migration policy not be put to a vote, and, on the other hand, to a WhatsApp group she had heard about that included members of the conservative European People's Party (EPP) and the far right.
Migration, she agreed, was a topic that had to be discussed, and rules were needed. The package as adopted, she said, was simply inhumane and tramples on human rights. "40% of the worlds refugees are children," she noted with concern.
