On strike: the push to make a difference on climate change?

We had an interesting discussion at work last week around the Extinction Rebellion actions earlier this year and their demands for immediate action on climate change (they want zero carbon by 2025 and not 2050 as the government legislation has called for).

The conversation whirled around whether they achieved anything through their direct actions, and can a business support what they are doing?

With regards the first bit - the fact that the UK government has not only finally declared a climate emergency, but has also enacted legislation to have the UK at zero carbon emissions by 2050, would suggest that their work (and those of other activists) is finally making an impact. People have tried the polite lobbying of politicians and the like outside Westminster for a long time, without much joy, so this more 'in your face' method - while unpalatable to some, seems to be quite effective.

As to whether businesses can join in with this, is a much harder question. When I go to work I have to take off my idealist hat to some degree, and put on my more pragmatic one. Words like 'extinction' and 'rebellion' cause the standard and quite conservative standard business to recoil in horror. They tend to like slow and steady, rather than urgent and reactive. So, from a work perspective we have decided that we can show support for climate action, but we will perhaps have to choose our words more carefully.

What is a climate emergency?
Of course there is no precise definition, but this seems to be a byword for taking immediate action and developing policy to mitigate climate change beyond current government targets (before the new updated climate legislation, the Climate Change Act 2008 called for an 80% reduction in UK emissions by 2050 - from a 1990 base).

The phrase was already common among environmental groups, but seems to have first gained use in political circles with Carla Denyer, a Green Party councillor in Bristol, who used the term in November 2018.

Who has declared one?
Aside from the UK government, there have been a number of local authorities who joined in with these declarations (this list is taken from www.climateemergency.uk and was up to mid-July 2019).

• 3 Cities - Liverpool, Greater London Authority, West Yorkshire
• 16 Counties - from Devon to Leicestershire
• 99 Districts - from Maidstone all the way up to South Lakeland
• 22 London Boroughs
• 24 Metropolitan Boroughs
• 62 Unitary Authorities - including much of Scotland

Climate Strikes:
The rise of student activism and organised groups like Extinction Rebellion and Greenpeace culminated in last Friday's Climate Strike, which gained traction across the globe. An estimated 4 million people took part in over 4,600 events organised in at least 139 countries.

• London: at least 100,000 went to the main event, although many smaller ones were organised around the capital
• Edinburgh: estimated 20,000 people
• Brighton: estimated 10,000 people
• Belfast: estimated 3-4,000 people
• Birmingham: estimated 3,000 people
• New York City: school districts were giving pupils permission to attend events, and the main one around Battery Park saw an incredible 250,000 people convene
• Melbourne and Sydney: these cities saw some of the biggest mass protests in Australian history, with as many as 150,000 people at each event
• Certainly over 350,000 in total at the 110 organised rallies
• Berlin: Germany also had some big turn outs, with around 100,000 in the nations capital
• The German coalition government has pledged £48bn for schemes to cut greenhouse gases.

Some of the big tech company employees were also taking this very seriously.

• Amazon: around 1,800 global Amazon staff walked out on Friday.
• Jeff Bezos made a preemptive announcement on Thursday, saying that Amazon will be carbon neutral by 2040, and have 50% reduction in shipping footprint by 2030.
• His staff want more though: they are calling for zero emissions by 2030, more ULEV vehicles in their fleet, and to stop contracts with fossil fuel companies and support for climate change denying think-tanks.
• There were also walk-outs by Google and other big tech company staff

Greta Thunberg spoke at the NYC rally Friday; "We demand a safe future. Is that really too much to ask?" And she had this to say to her critics, "If you belong to that small group of people who feel threatened by us, we have some very bad news for you, because this is only the beginning. Change is coming whether they like it or not."

Jessica Ahmed, 16, attending one rally said, "If politicians were taking the appropriate action we need - and had been taking this action a long time ago when it was recognised the world was changing in a negative way - then I would not have to be skipping school."

The big picture:
There were also protests in Kiribati, that are somewhat poignant, as this is the country that could well be the first one to (literally) disappear, as it is so at risk from sea level rises. In Tuvalu last month, Australia thwarted an effort by the Pacific Island nations for more actions on climate change (one leader broke down with the emotion). Last week Australia and New Zealand, with 16 Pacific Island nations, finally reached some agreements, but these were far short of what was hoped for.

Research:
This article was researched from a wide range of rolling 'live' news sites, with numerous pages from each used - but for reference they were;
BBC News
The Guardian
CNN
The Standard