As wildfires break out across England and up to 50% of crops are expected to fail, when will the UK government declare a climate emergency?

33 comments

  2. They won’t, because doing so would mean admitting to the masses that our current and successive governments have sleepwalked us into catastrophe.

  4. What would declaring a climate emergency actually mean though? It would just be a press conference and a couple of days of news stories about it and then nothing would change except instead of people calling for a climate emergency declaration as a way of saying the government weren’t acting they’d be pointing out that one had been declared as a way of pointing out the government weren’t acting. I like the spirit of it but it would just be a token gesture imo. Probably better to focus energy on campaigning for action instead of announcements

  8. toryism is the religious dogma of utter irresponsibility, so, when a large enough crowd makes it clear where responsibility is.

  10. The problem is far bigger than the U.K., the U.K. could go 100% carbon negative. But globally this reduction would be erased in 6 weeks with the CO2 growth from China alone.

    Currently the U.K. produces 38% less CO2 than 1990 and that is with a far bigger population.

  12. I’ve posted this elsewhere, but it bears repeating. During high fire risk days, don’t do these things outdoors, even on your property:

    * light any kind of fire, including BBQs/bonfires/campfires
    * angle grinding/welding/soldering
    * set off fireworks
    * drive off-road where your car will come in contact with vegetation
    * smoke cigarettes or pipes or cigars, or throw lit cigarette butts out of car windows

    This applies not just to the countryside but built up areas as well. “I’ll be careful!” — no, shit happens. Just don’t do it. It’s not worth being the idiot who started a mega-fire. These lessons are written in blood from places that live with wildfires like Australia. Don’t do it.

  13. Declaring a climate emergency is meaningless. There’s an endless parade of local authorities who have made a huge fanfare of “declaring” a climate “emergency” neither of which they’ve defined or have any force in law and then… gone on to do the same thing they were doing the day before in terms of their operations.

    It would be good if the government announced that they were going to target steeper emissions reductions than already committed to (and work with partners to get other large emitters on board).

    It would be great, really, if they could put forward a coherent set of policies to build in the initial buildings strategy since unlike in electricity and transport, we’re not on track to meet our targets.

    (There are a lot of water reservoirs and water transfer schemes already being considered by Ofwat so no point preempting that process but they could give some words of support and indicate that they were in favour of some big schemes going ahead)

    But declaring an “emergency”? What does that do? No more declaring, only action.

  15. When and if it becomes both financially profitable & politically advantageous to do so. And not before.

  17. The only emergency Rishi and Liz will acknowledge is whatever imagined culture war issue currently plays well to the tiny fraction of the population currently choosing our next Prime Minister in a mockery of democracy. Never mind the fact the planet is burning, haven’t you heard that the civil service is both woke and antisemitic?

  18. What would declaring it a climate emergency achieve?

    Oop, the government declared an emergency, guess I’ll stop burning now, said the plant.

  19. They’re all on holiday, Jesus, have some respect won’t you. Talking down the UK like that! We need more climate change to stimulate growth! /s

  23. Never. It appears that not only do they want the failed Brexit, they also want reduce the nations ability to feed itself in future. This is democide, unbridled and with the collusion of the MSM, who haven’t held power to account for at least 12yrs.

  25. Maybe I’m not observant enough to know for sure. But a field that I walk past quite often is growing wheat. I can’t be sure that it isn’t something that it usually does this time of year. But I’m fairly sure that it’s usually just left fallow – where dog walkers have their pups gallop around after their favourite balls in a way that they cannot on the paths around it.

    Perhaps it’s just the economics of it all. That failing crops and raising prices mean that what was once uneconomical for this farmer now makes enough to cover their costs. And there isn’t any immediate threat beyond a forewarning of things to come if we do not change our economies to lower emissions.

    But even if we are immediately safe. Seeing those green ears does nothing to put me at ease.

  27. Declare a climate emergency? I presume they would get a load of leaflets printed and post them out to say that this has happened, and that’s about it.

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