Monthly Archives: July 2023

Green Party condems Labour Party U-turn on climate

Spread the love

The Green Party has accused the Labour Party of failing the climate and the people of the UK after watering down its pledge to invest £28bn a year in green industries if it wins power at the next general election.

Green Party co-leader Adrian Ramsay said

“This highlights more than ever why it is necessary to have more Green MPs elected at the next General Election.

“We are witnessing environmental breakdown at an increasingly alarming rate, so you would have thought the Labour Party would understand that we need to see a transformational change if we are going to tackle the climate emergency along with the cost of living crisis that is causing so much harm in our society.

“Yet once again we see them offer a policy that does not go far enough, and then row back at the first sign of any difficulty.

“The Green Party has pledged to invest almost £100bn each year for ten years to decarbonise our economy, including £25bn alone on insulating people’s homes, £12bn on increasing our renewable capacity and £14bn on rail and walking and cycling.

“Only the Green Party is coming forward with the practical and sensible solutions to the crises this country faces and whoever wins at the next general election, it is vital we have a group of Green MPs fighting for the environment and those who have been ignored for too long by the main two parties.”

Continue ReadingGreen Party condems Labour Party U-turn on climate

Last Generation disrupt German and Austrian cities

Spread the love

There are difficulties keeping abreast of Last Generation / Letzte Generation activities in Germany since they are often reported only in the German language. I’ve used online translation for this article but it certainly appears that Last Generation are very active at the moment.

vienna@orf.at

Activists glued themselves to the Autobahn

The south-east tangent (A23) was blocked by climate activists of the “last generation” on Monday morning. Both directions of travel were affected by the action. Traffic collapsed at times.

Online since today, 11.20 a.m

There were protests in a total of six places today, 40 people were involved in the protests, according to “Last Generation”. “The first blockades began today at half past seven in the morning, we were at Altmannsdorfer Ast until ten to nine,” said “Last Generation” spokesman David Sonnenbaum.

It’s about “reminding the government of its legal obligation to protect the population,” continued “Last Generation” spokesman Florian Wagner. The climate activists drove to the southeast tangent in vehicles. There they got out and glued themselves.

The A23 was blocked, activists stuck to it.

Last generation Austria
Early traffic in Vienna was at a standstill at times

The result of the action was the temporary closure of the A23 at the Absberg tunnel not far from the roundabout. Commuters had to dodge the S1 over a large area. Also on the S1 it jammed later. “We have always assigned police officers just in case,” police spokesman Markus Dittrich told wien.ORF.at. More than 20 arrests were made.

Previously, there had already been no progress in either direction on the A23 to Vösendorf or the Prater junction. The west entrance was also a traffic jam hotspot. The police reported blockades at Altmannsdorfer Ast, at Schönbrunn Palace and at Schüttelstrasse. According to Radio Vienna Traffic Information, there were severe delays in early traffic.

“The richest are ruining our future”

“The richest are ruining our future,” read one of the activists’ banners. An indication that in Austria the emissions of the richest percent of the population have increased by a whopping 45 percent since 1990, while the majority of the population today cause less CO2, according to the “Last Generation”. On Tuesday, the activists will announce further planned protests.

red, wien.ORF.at/ agencies

Link:

Continue ReadingLast Generation disrupt German and Austrian cities

Twenty one Just Stop Oil supporters arrested

Spread the love

Just Stop Oil are demanding that the UK government halt any new licensing or consents for oil, gas and coal extraction in the UK.

In an escalation of resistance from previous weeks, 180 Just Stop Oil supporters, in fourteen groups, began marching on key roads in central London. They marched in groups of between 5 and 25 supporters, carrying placards reading “new oil = murder”, “ hottest June ever” and “can’t eat oil”.

Police followed numerous groups before marches began and stopped and searched dozens of people. Police began issuing Public Order Act (Section 12) notices at 8:10am, just minutes after the first march set off. Three Just Stop Oil supporters were arrested after 15 minutes of marching on Liverpool Street. Around twenty Just Stop Oil supporters were arrested as they attempted to leave Lambeth bridge, however 11 of these were de-arrested. The team in Victoria was removed by 8:35. Police were seen following marchers on the tube at 9:00am. Another two were arrested on Liverpool Street at 9:45. At 10:30 two were arrested on Victoria Street.

Frances Davis, 20, from Norwich spoke to the camera as she was held in handcuffs:

“I’ve been marching for just under 15 minutes and I’m under arrest for demanding the same thing as the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), the United Nations and the government’s own scientific advisors have been demanding- and we’ve just been ignored. We’ve tried everything else and now I’m in handcuffs, just for going on a march.”

This morning’s marches come as extreme heat continues to ravage Europe and now 110 million people have been issued extreme heat warnings in the US, as a heat dome over the US south-west has translated into coast to coast alerts. Temperature records could be broken in as many as 38 cities. In Las Vegas security guards can be seen guarding the fountains of upscale casinos and hotels to prevent people from jumping in, whilst mobile clinics are reporting treating homeless people suffering from third-degree burns.

Since the Just Stop Oil campaign launched on 14th February 2022, there have been over 2,200 arrests and 138 people have spent time in prison, many without trial. Just Stop Oil supporters Morgan Trowland and Marcus Decker are serving three-year prison sentences for resisting new oil, gas and coal in the longest sentences for peaceful climate action in British history.

Juststopoil.org.

Continue ReadingTwenty one Just Stop Oil supporters arrested

Warning that 1.5C to be passed this year or next

Spread the love
Climate protestors march in Washington DC
Climate protestors march in Washington DC

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jul/16/red-alert-the-worlds-hottest-week-ever-and-more-is-to-forecast-to-come

… [M]any scientists warn that this year or next could see world temperatures pass the 1.5C threshold that was set by the IPCC as being the upper limit for a rise in global warming that would avoid the planet passing through meteorological tipping points that could bring irreversible changes to world weather patterns.

The consequences of a new record heatwave occurring very soon will be profound and dangerous, add scientists. More than 61,000 people are now estimated to have died as a result of the soaring temperatures that gripped Europe last summer.

Given the likelihood of that record being broken this year – or next year at the latest – there is a strong chance that 2022’s grim death toll will be topped very soon with Mediterranean nations such as Greece, Spain and Italy likely to suffer the worst consequences.

According to UN secretary general António Guterres “climate change is out of control”. He warned that if the world persisted in delaying key measures needed to limit fossil fuel emissions, it would move “into a catastrophic situation”.

Many scientists have reacted to this alarm with rueful resignation. They have warned for more than 30 years that continued burning of fossil fuels would trigger the heatwaves that we are now experiencing.

“We should not be at all surprised with the high global temperatures,” Prof Richard Betts, climate scientist at the Met Office and University of Exeter, told the BBC. “This is all a stark reminder of what we’ve known for a long time, and we will see ever-more extremes until we stop building up more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.”

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jul/16/red-alert-the-worlds-hottest-week-ever-and-more-is-to-forecast-to-come

Continue ReadingWarning that 1.5C to be passed this year or next

Breaking: Starmer says he will NOT change 2-child cap impoverishing 1.5 million kids

Spread the love

Original article republished from the Skwawkbox for non-commercial use

Image of Keir Starmer and a poor child.

At least 1.5 million children are living in poverty because of the Tories’ two-child benefit cap – many of them going hungry – damaging their health, their education and their chances throughout their entire life and leaving them stigmatised and traumatised.

Keir Starmer has previously caused outrage by refusing to commit to ending the cap if Labour gets into government. But this morning on the BBC he went a step further and confirmed that he will not end the cap:

https://videopress.com/embed/YzqpIHOc?cover=1&preloadContent=metadata&useAverageColor=1&hd=1

On everything else the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg asked him, Starmer refused to answer one way or the other, using the excuse that he’s ‘not going to write our manifesto here’.

But lifting at least 250,000 kids out of poverty and giving another 1.25 million a massive leg-up to being out of poverty that they are suffering through no fault of their own?

No – on that, Starmer was more than happy to ‘write the manifesto here’, confirming that Labour has no interest in those children or their 400,000 families, most of them working, let alone their relatives who will be equally horrified. Presumably, he thinks poor people don’t vote – or that he doesn’t need them if he can suck up to enough Tories and big business.

A Starmer win means another five years of Tory government, just as much as would a win for the blue version.

Original article republished from the Skwawkbox for non-commercial use

Continue ReadingBreaking: Starmer says he will NOT change 2-child cap impoverishing 1.5 million kids