The Far North
All-Stars Affinity Group’s section of the XR Site 6, Westminster,Monday
morning, 7 October 2019
Written by
Allan Todd
“The health
of ecosystems on which we and all other species depend is deteriorating more
rapidly than ever…We are eroding the very foundations of economies,
livelihoods, food security, health and quality of life worldwide. We have lost
time. We must act now.”
Johnson - I
absolutely refuse to refer to a dangerous political opportunist, who’s
deliberately made racist, sexist and homophobic comments in order to further
his career, by his first name! - accused October’s Extinction Rebellion
activists of being “unco-operative crusties.”
I leave it up
to those who know me to judge whether or not I’m particularly ‘crusty’(!) - but
I proudly embrace and own the term ‘unco-operative’! I, for one, certainly have
absolutely no intention of co-operating in the government’s persistent refusal
to take the climate actions needed to keep UK citizens safe from the growing
impacts of Climate Breakdown.
Which is why
I - along with Jack Lenox (Green Party PPC for Copeland) and around 70 other
Cumbrians from various Extinction Rebellion groups from Carlisle, Penrith and
Kendal - was down in London for the start of XR’s fortnight of action this
October.
Our task -
along with a large number of Extinction Rebellion groups from Scotland and the
North East - was to help take and then hold Site 6 in Westminster on Monday 7
October - ideally, for the whole 2 weeks. This site had been designated as
Power In Truth:
XR Site 6 -
Power In Truth
I was
particularly pleased to have the honour of taking - quite literally! - the
first steps in securing our particular section of that XR site.
Although,
sadly, our site - like most of the other sites - was ‘cleared’ by the police by
the end of the first week, that ‘unco-operative’ streak is why I also went back
down for the start of the second week of the XR action in London, on 14
October.
Why
‘unco-operative’??
I know not
everyone approves of an elected councillor taking part in peaceful civil
disobedience - up to and including the point of arrest. To those who are
unhappy with my actions, I have only this to say:
“I’m
‘unco-operative’ because I simply refuse to co-operate - by standing on the
sidelines - in this government’s criminal inaction over the looming Climate
Crisis.”
If anyone
thinks that’s an exaggerated or unfair description of the UK government’s
‘action’ on reducing carbon emissions, I suggest they acquaint themselves with
the most recent Report by the government’s own Committee on Climate Change,
published this July. This is chaired by Lord Deben - a Tory member of the House
of Lords, and formerly the Tory MP John Gummer.
In that
Report, he pointed out that the UK government had only met 1 of the 25
‘targets’ it had set itself for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. In fact, he
went so far as to say this about the government’s ‘plans’ to tackle the Climate
Crisis:
"The whole thing is really run by
the government like a Dad's Army. We can't go on with this ramshackle
system."
For an excellent overview on just how
serious a crisis we are facing, check out the first part of the 10 October
edition of BBC Question Time, in which Rupert Read - a leading Green Party member and
Extinction Rebellion spokesperson - set out the situation in very clear but
stark terms:
Times are
definitely changing when the first question, which occupied almost half the
show, was about the Climate Crisis and the radical ecological movement that has
mushroomed since Extinction Rebellion was first launched at the end of October
2018.
For further
confirmation of why the government needs to be pushed to take urgent and
serious action on the Climate Crisis, here is a link to what the renowned
campaigning journalist and environmental activist, George Monbiot, had to say
in Trafalgar Square, at the start of this month’s Extinction Rebellion:
To disrupt or
not to disrupt
Some people
ask whether the disruption caused by Extinction Rebellion’s actions is
justified. I’m fully aware of how inconvenient being caught in a traffic jam is
- especially if there’s somewhere you urgently need to be.
But the
impacts of global warming have already caused much greater disruption to the
lives of thousands of people - including in Cumbria where, since 2005, we have
had three ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ floods: 2005, 2009 and 2015.
Whilst I have
been fortunate enough to escape (so far), I saw the huge impact flooding has on
people when our younger daughter and family were flooded in Corbridge, as a
result of Storm Desmond, in December 2015.
We all know
now that the current level of global warming has already increased the average
temperature of our oceans - and that this is resulting in more, and more
serious, extreme weather events.
Even in
economically-developed countries, these extreme weather events have already
claimed several lives. Whilst, in the Global South, the number of deaths is in
the thousands.
Yet this Tory
government - like the Tory/LibDem coalition of 2010-15 before it - is still
promoting fracking: one of the most extreme fossil fuel industries. At the same
time, it is cutting subsidies to clean renewable energy projects, whilst
continuing to give massive amounts of taxpayers’ money to the dirty energy
companies.
Many
environmental campaigners are not surprised by this state of affairs - as
several reports over the past few years have repeatedly pointed out that many
government ministers have links (present and/or past) to the finance and/or
dirty energy companies which are continuing to drive global warming. This is
sometimes referred to as the ‘finance-energy complex’:
The existence
of such a ‘fossil fuel web of power’ may help explain why governments since
2010 have done so little to move our economy to clean energy. If dirty energy
giants such as BP, Shell and Texaco - and the dirty banks that finance their
destructive (but profitable) Climate Crimes - are able to exert such influence
over our democracy, it is no wonder that ordinary citizens are increasingly
forced to take to the streets to disrupt these companies’ ‘business as usual’:
Approaching the ‘Cliff of Climate
Breakdown’
Last year,
the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warned that we had
only 12 years in which to make MASSIVE cuts in greenhouse emissions if we wish
to avoid uncontrollable Climate Breakdown. David Attenborough has warned that
humanity is facing its greatest threat in thousands of years as a result of
human-driven climate change:
“If we don’t take action, the collapse
of our civilisations, and the extinction of much of the natural world on which
we depend, is on the horizon.”
Recent
studies show the 20 warmest years on record have been in the past 22 years and
the top 4 in the past 4 years - & each one breaking the previous record.
Scientist are now broadly agreed that climate action must be increased
five-fold to limit global warming to 1.5C & pointed out at COP24 that:
“We are the last generation that can
stop climate change.”
Three
possible Climate outcomes
It’s worth
remembering that the figures that have come out of the various IPCC Reports
since 1988 - when the IPCC was first set up - are the result of compromises,
which has meant that their projections have always been notoriously -
and often dangerously - conservative and thus have often underestimated the
risks we are facing.
In
particular, oceans are now warming 40% faster than the UN predicted just 5
years ago. As a consequence, on every single continent, climate disruption - on
a planetary scale - is no longer a future threat, but a lived reality. In
almost every aspect associated with global warming, things are unravelling
significantly faster than most scientific models had originally predicted.
In April this
year, a far-ranging study on the impacts of global warming on the Arctic
concluded that ice is now melting so rapidly that:
In April this
year, a far-ranging study on the impacts of global warming on the Arctic
concluded that ice is now melting so rapidly that:
“the Arctic biophysical system is now
clearly trending away from its 20th. Century state and into an unprecedented
state, with implications not only within but also beyond the Arctic.”
In May, a UN
Report revealed the startling loss of wildlife around the world, showing that a
million species of animals and plants are at risk of extinction:
“The health of ecosystems on which we
and all other species depend is deteriorating more rapidly than ever…We are
eroding the very foundations of economies, livelihoods, food security, health
and quality of life worldwide. We have lost time. We must act now.”
What next for Extinction Rebellion?
So far,
Extinction Rebellion has focussed its protests on the government, in an attempt
to force it to start taking serious actions to drastically reduce carbon
emissions. As stated above, one very significant explanation of the
government’s increasingly criminal inaction is the massive influence wielded by
the dirty energy companies, and the dirty banks that finance them.
So, as well
as continuing to disrupt government departments, I think the time has now come
for us to target our protests in a more specific way, to also disrupt the
‘business as usual’ of the dirty energy companies, and the dirty banks that
continue to facilitate their Climate Crimes:
Barclays -
The Dirty Bank
Even if
people are not prepared to take non-violent direct action, there are numerous
non-arrestable roles that people can do, to help support those who are
prepared, if necessary, to be arrested. At the very least, there are things
individuals can do at home:
1. If you
haven’t already done so, switch to an energy supplier that is based entirely on
clean, renewable energy, such as: Ecotricity or Good Energy
2. In the
same way, switch to a bank that doesn’t fund/facilitate the dirty energy
projects that are driving the world ever closer to Climate Breakdown. These
more ethical banks include: The Cumberland Building Society and The
Co-operative Bank. If you’re currently with Barclays or HSBC, please make sure
that, when you do switch, you email their respective CEOs to tell them why
you’ve switched - and that you’ll be encouraging all your family and friends to
do likewise:
Barclays:
jes.staley@barclays.com
HSBC:
john.flint@hsbc.com
Lists of
clean energy suppliers and ethical banks can be found in ‘The Ethical Consumer’
magazine: https://www.ethicalconsumer.org/
Despite the
police having cleared all XR sites -
XR activists
continued blocking actions into the second week - including, on Monday 14 October,
the area around Threadneedle Street and Lombard Street, in front of the Bank of
England, which was successfully blocked until just after 5.00pm. Even the
blanket ban on all XR protests, issued by the Met Police the following day, did
not - despite random stopping and searching - stop the protests.
The message
is clear: we will continue to ‘Rebel For Life’ until the government stops
putting the narrow financial interests of the dirty energy companies and the
dirty banks first and, instead, takes serious action to protect our planet:
Rebel For
life
Allan Todd is a member of Allerdale
& Copeland Green Party, an XR activist and a Green Left supporter
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