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Conference, on behalf of the Defra ministerial team - Phil Woolas, Jeff Rooker, Joan Ruddock, and Jonathan Shaw - I want to begin by paying tribute to the people who worked so hard during the terrible floods this summer.

People like the driver I met in Doncaster delivering sandbags to make sure that families and pensioners were protected, even though the water was rising in his own home.

The staff I met in a rest centre, providing shelter and a comforting word to those who had nowhere else to go.

Neighbour helping neighbour, showing the strength and humanity of the British people when times are tough.

I also want to thank all those who are working so hard, and with such calm purpose, to contain the outbreak of foot and mouth and to deal with bluetongue, both causing so much hardship to farmers across the country.

And I know Conference that you will want to thank all these people too.

In their different ways, both these events remind us just how delicate is our relationship with this small and fragile planet.

We cannot take it for granted.

But we can help to safeguard it.

Thanks to what we've done over the past ten years, we now have cleaner rivers and beaches, purer water to drink, healthier air to breathe, and a countryside that is open to each and every one of us to enjoy.

And I can confirm today that we now intend to legislate so that each of us has, for the first time in our history, the right to walk around our coastline from the white cliffs of the South Coast to the wild cliffs of Northumberland.

And we'll do this because access for all is a Labour value, and it should apply as much to our coast as it does to education or our health service.

But Conference we need to do much, much more, because we face a stark choice.

Britain can either lead the world in a low carbon transformation of our economy, in protecting our countryside and wildlife, and in renewing our cities, with new jobs in new environmental industries, or we can be left behind.

As individuals, we can either learn to live more sustainably today or, in a few years' time, face having to tell our grandchildren why, as a generation, we did not act while we still had time.

Climate change is happening now.

This was the wettest summer on record. The last 12 months have been the hottest on record.

And that's just in Britain. Look around the world.

Hurricanes in Central America. Drought in Australia. Floods and drought in Africa.

Last year I went to Wajid in Somalia where 11,000 people were living in makeshift shelters covered in scraps of cloth and plastic they had taken from the town's rubbish tip. Why? Because it had stopped raining where they had been living. Climate change had put their lives were on hold.

What are we going to do when people start fighting, not about politics, but about water?

What are we going to do when people start arriving at our shores fleeing not from political persecution but from environmental catastrophe?

That's why we must act now.

Our Climate Change Bill will make us the first country in the world to put carbon reduction targets into law. And as the Prime Minister announced on Monday, we will now review whether we need a stronger target than our already ambitious 60% reduction by 2050.

But Conference people don't see their lives through Bills, and Targets, and Plans.

They live them, and our politics must be about their future.

It's not what we have done that really matters now.

It is what we can achieve together for the next generation, reaching out to those who share our values; as individuals, as activists, as a movement for change.

What could that change look like?

Imagine a child born today.

By the time she is three years old, we will be recycling and composting 40% of our waste.

By the time she is eight, Britain will be generating 15% of our electricity from renewables - three times as much as we do now.

By the time she celebrates her ninth birthday, every single new house built that year and for the rest of her life will be zero carbon, millions of existing homes will be better insulated, and microgeneration will be a reality for many of her friends and neighbours, and not just a few pioneers.

And as she grows up, she will be able to watch the London Array generating enough electricity from wind power to supply 1 in 4 homes in Greater London.

All this is possible. In fact, this is what we are going to do.

One step at a time, sure of where we are headed.

That's why I am pleased to tell you today about the next step we are taking. The major retailers and energy suppliers are now leading a voluntary initiative, with the strong support of the lighting industry and the government, to help phase out traditional high-energy light bulbs.

We need to turn them off - for good.

So our aim is for traditional 150W light bulbs to be phased out by January next year, 100W bulbs the year after, 40W bulbs the year after that and all high energy light bulbs by 2011.
This will save 5 million tonnes of CO2 a year and take us closer to our 2050 target.

But we will also have to learn to adapt to a climate that is already changing.

It's why early next year we will set out a new Adaptation Plan that will look at the risks to our communities and wildlife from rising temperatures, flooding and drought, and how we should respond.

It's why we are leading in Europe to reform the Common Agricultural Policy and make sure that we nurture and protect our biodiversity, including birdlife.

And with the publication of our draft Marine Bill we will realise a long-held dream to extend the protection we already have for the wonders of our countryside to the wonders of our seas and what lies beneath them.

But whatever we do here in the UK, it is what we do internationally that will decide whether the world can prevent catastrophic climate change or not.

On Monday I was at the United Nations in New York, where Ban Ki-moon brought together Heads of Government for the first time to call for action.

December's crucial meeting in Bali must answer that call by agreeing to start negotiations on a new international deal to replace the Kyoto protocol and make us a low carbon world.

Every country must play its part - from China to the USA. The biggest economy in the world must take on binding commitments to reduce emissions. Voluntary action isn't enough.

As Al Gore has taught us, we have to speak the truth even if it is inconvenient for some.

Conference, learning to live within the means of our fragile planet demands a new politics.

A politics that listens, and works more closely with people.

A politics that makes it clear what we stand for.

You can't be for renewable energy but against wind farms.

You can't be for environmental regulation and against European action.

A politics that recognises that tackling climate change and sustaining our environment is part of the same fight that has inspired our Party from the beginning - the fight for social justice.

A politics that asks each of us to play our part and make our contribution.

Neighbour helping neighbour.

These are our values. They inspire us.

They're why we want to change the world. But to do that, we also have to save it.

And we can only do so together.