We lobby our MP on climate change
Our meeting with Diana Johnson was held at Asda on Kingswood. It had
been raining quite heavily all day and there were some traffic accidents
in town, which meant that although the meeting was scheduled for 5.30
pm, Diana was almost an hour late. However, we had a very friendly talk
with her assistant, Mark, while we were waiting.
Eventually, Diana arrived, and we made our presentation. Haris
started the presentation, outlining the main points for legislation on
climate change. She had thoughtfully written these on cards, which she
handed to Diana, as an aide memoire. Haris specified the action Hull FoE
want Diana to take: to write to Tony Blair and David Miliband, asking them
to include the Climate Change Bill in the Queen’s Speech.
The Bill would:
- make 3 per cent year-on-year cuts in CO2 emissions mandatory;
- require an annual report to Parliament on progress in reducing CO2
emissions;
- require Ministers to be held to account for the successful
implementation of the Bill.
We then had a very useful discussion, covering several points.
Targets must be annual and mandatory to ensure all governments remain
committed. Setting long-term targets is not the answer as this tends to
engender complacency, and allows MPs to continue to focus on the short
term.
A Bill would send an important message to everyone: individuals and
businesses, to take action. It would foster the development of
energy-efficient technologies.
Alan added that actual legislation rather than mere voluntary
agreements would make for a more level playing field.
When priorities were mentioned Alan asked whether climate change had
the highest priority. Receiving the answer ‘no’ but that education etc
had higher priority he pointed out that, following a point that Diana
made to the effect that the trouble with politicians was that they always
operated on short time scales, that though it was true that in the
short term other things had higher priority, in the long term all this
constructive effort would be wasted if as a result of, for instance, rising
sea level huge areas of agricultural land were flooded all over the
world plus many large coastal cities with the result that there would be
an acute, not to mention chronic, shortage of food, housing and general
infrastructure, there would very likely be a breakdown in civil order
and civilisation might collapse. That is how serious this is though it
is unlikely to happen for a few decades. The question might be, ‘How
many people care enough about their grandchildren to try to make sure the
world as we know it will still be there when they have families of
their own?’
In so far as education has a high priority perhaps it should be used to
help everyone to be aware of the realities of global warming. If
nothing else the prospect of being permanently flooded out of one’s home
should perhaps increase motivation to learn at least the elements of the
science involved and what we can do to avoid the otherwise inevitable
consequences of upsetting the ecosystem. The fact is we need to start
taking very significant action now, difficult though it might be, before it
becomes impossibly difficult to avoid a tragic catastrophe.
Diana agreed to write to Tony Blair and David Miliband, giving us a
copy of her letters, and their replies.
We were also able to tell her about our pioneering scheme to collect
and compost garden waste. She makes use of it herself, and said that her
local council in London offers garden waste collection.
She offered to come to one of our meetings whenever we thought that
would be useful and said she would like to be added to the Hull ECO
mailing list.
After about half an hour, the discussion was concluded, we thanked
Diana, and Mark, and left.
