Greenpeace France has been busy at the Paris Motor Show. By 9:30AM on the first day the show was open to the public we'd hung up a giant banner showing the Earth being squashed after being run over by a car, right outside the main entrance.

© Greenpeace

With all the green claims at this year's show, it was vital that we brought people's attention to the fact that car makers are still happy to churn out the money-spinning gas guzzling cars. So later that day, fifty activists locked themselves in the most polluting vehicles on the stands of the main German manufacturers (BMW and Mercedes in Hall 1; Audi and Volkswagen in Hall 4). They attached stickers to the car windscreens demanding « Sauvons le climat: 120 g de CO2/km en 2012 » (“Save the climate : 120g/km by 2012”) and sounded their horns.

© Mora/Greenpeace

The event attracted masses of media coverage in France, as well as other countries including Spain and Portugal.

With President Sarkozy holding the reigns at the EU until the end of the year it's important for French people to make their voices heard to show him what we think of the deal he wants to push through the EU, a deal that would mean the car makers will hardly have to make any improvements until 2015.

And that's not all, Sarkozy has just announced his plan for a 400 million euro subsidy to French car makers to help them make greener cars, which is scandalous when you realise that they've known this has been coming for years, and they should be able to meet the targets anyway. It's also scandalous to offer the carmakers public money when Sarkozy is trying to kill off the EU legislation - the only tool we have to make sure they produce fuel efficient cars.

Remember, efficient cars are good for the climate and for the people who buy them. So the carmakers, together with Angela Merkel and Nicolas Sarkozy are cheating the climate and European citizens.

But you can do something to help - sign our petition to President Sarkozy calling for the EU to set targets of 120g CO2/km in 2012, and 80 g CO2/km in 2020.

Anne Valette, Climate campaigner at Greenpeace France.