A majority of European Union lawmakers were hoping to symbolically declare a “climate emergency” on Monday, a week before a U.N. climate conference in Madrid. Members of the European Parliament said the declaration would increase pressure on the incoming EU executive, expected to start work on Dec. 1, to take a stronger leading role in the global fight against climate change. “The EU must act together and lead by example in international climate negotiations through concrete actions and measures,” the centre-left Socialists and Democrats (S&D), the second-largest group of lawmakers in the parliament, said in a statement on Monday.