A Conservative Government would introduce mandatory year-on-year reduction targets for carbon emissions, leader David Cameron has said.
Mr Cameron said there was no chance of meeting the Government's aim of a 60 per cent cut in emissions by 2050 without constant pressure from targets.
He stepped up pressure on the Prime Minister as the Conservatives launched their own Climate Change Bill which would establish a statutory duty to meet annual targets, set by an independent commission.
Appointed by the cross-party Commons Environmental Audit Committee, the commission would also be responsible for monitoring the UK's progress towards the 2050 goal.
Shadow environment secretary Peter Ainsworth said they were not proposing a "rigid annual target" but a "rolling programme of targets".
"They would be adjusted mathematically according to the progress or otherwise we make," he said.
The promise followed Tony Blair's pledge the Government's next steps on climate change would deliver cuts in carbon emissions — but appeared to shy away from setting an annual target.
It is widely expected the Queen's Speech later next month will include a Climate Change Bill with long-term green targets.
But Blair refused to be drawn over the Bill but said the proposals would be "practicable and workable."
More than 400 MPs and environmental campaigners are calling for the Government to introduce statutory year on year three per cent reduction targets but Mr Blair said the suggested targets would be "very very difficult" to achieve.
Environment Secretary David Miliband is thought to be considering long-term requirements on a decade by decade basis.
But Conservative MP Tim Yeo, chairman of the all-party Commons Environmental Audit Committee, said: "I hope the Climate Change Bill will contain a requirement for the Government to set annual targets - not just five or 10-year ones - and to report to Parliament annually on its progress towards meeting them.
"This is a chance for Britain to set an example which other countries might then follow."
Cameron said if the Government failed to address the need for annual targets the Tories would work with ministers to improve it.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs refused to confirm or deny whether a Climate Change Bill would feature in the Queen's Speech on November 15.
Miliband said the Government needed to examine "all options."
