Public information for schools,forums, papers, libraries: Please address appalling absence of information on the climate/ biodiversity crises
Soo Chapman
🌍URGENT ACTION NEEDED: Plastics are destroying our oceans, and it’s killing marine life and harming people!
Plastics kill OVER A MILLION species every year due to almost 600 MILLION POUNDS of plastic waste that’s dumped into the ocean. Tiny floating plastic pieces look just like fish to innocent wildlife like baby sea turtles who mistake it for food. In fact, scientists predict that if we continue at this rate of plastic pollution, there could actually be MORE PLASTIC THAN FISH in the ocean in just 30 years. But if we take immediate steps to curb the plastic crisis, there’s still a chance we can protect our oceanic ecosystems. Will you add your name now and demand action to STOP plastic pollution?
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Helpless marine creatures choke to death, get trapped or entangled, or die from ingesting toxic plastics. And since plastic is NOT biodegradable, it never goes away. Instead, it accumulates in our environment -- killing marine life, contaminating our food and water supply, and even directly harming humans.
Plastic corporations burn through colossal amounts of fossil fuels during plastics manufacturing, ruining air quality and worsening the climate crisis. And these massive production plants are primarily located near communities of color where people already face disproportionately dangerous levels of pollution.
Dear Area Manager,
copying in the excellent Centre for Alternative Technology & CACC,
also hoping for a response from my MP on policy change before we trigger climate collapse,
Despite many requests there is continuing absence of a Public Information Programme so that everyone can prepare for the baked-in devastation humanity has already allowed. And continues to allow. Our world is changing daily and turning into planet hell. The carbon alerts could have been given at the same time as the covid alerts. Adults must act like adults and take responsibility for this ongoing global disaster. They must be incentivised and motivated to help us all avoid the death of the biosphere.
Change is still possible, however late.
Corrupt complicity with deadly and untruthful industries continues as it has for 50 years, and we've just witnessed environmental illiteracy on the channel 4 leadership debate.
Here's our chance to Salvage and Survive.
BCP council unaccountably continues to NOT spell out their climate report and prepare the public for the horrors ahead. Their recent PR exercise playing down sea level rise was unacceptable. The EA recommends managed retreat from the coast as we in Poole Agenda 21 suggested years ago.
The young people's request (Dec 2014 debate) for an off-shore wind farm that would have provided 767,000 homes' worth of clean Dorset energy and many jobs for Dorset was kicked back by untruths. Rampion's windfarm has done well and attracted visitors.
Magnificent, ground-breaking 80' Vestas blades produced just across the Solent, are exported globally but not to the benefit of the locals. So much for the Isle of Wight's Solent Offshore Renewable Energy Consortium!
Campaign Against Climate Change reports:
With the Met Office issuing its first ever red alert for extreme heat, we're facing an alarming heatwave, not just in the UK but across Europe. But the media aren't joining the dots to connect this record-breaking heat with the need for climate action.
So we thought it would be useful to put it in context. In three minutes, this video runs through the past year of climate breakdown. It shows that the current heatwave is only the latest extreme weather event to hit as fossil fuel burning destabilises our climate. You can view and share it on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter.
For more information about extreme weather, visit our web page 'Headlines from a warming world'
Meanwhile, the Tory leadership candidates seem to be speaking from a parallel universe, with debate focused not on how to ensure the UK's climate targets are met, or whether they should be strengthened, but on whether they should be scrapped. This is bad news not just for the climate but for people in the UK forced into poverty by spiralling fossil fuel prices and draughty uninsulated homes.
To avoid climate catastrophe, we need to fix our leaky housing and switch to cheap renewable energy to keep energy bills down now and in the future. We need climate jobs and a push to go beyond existing climate commitments. We cannot afford backtracking, a reckless push to drill 'every last drop' in the North Sea, or a focus on cutting taxes at the expense of investment and basic public services.
Whoever replaces Johnson, we'll be there to challenge them to act on climate change.
In the meantime, stay safe in the heatwave.
Claire
Campaigns Coordinator
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This letter appeared in today's Echo:
Colin Moyes (Have Your Say 12.7.22) says our present prime minister is alleged to have told some fibs but, "This hasn't resulted in anyone being killed."Unfortunately, although emergencies have been declared, world leaders, including our own leader, continue to back fossil fuels despite renewables being cheaper now. Millions are now dying of climate impacts. If we want the natural world - and us- to survive we should switch at speed before triggering collapse. So where is the information for the public about retaining future resources?
Angus Rose's brave 37 day hunger strike outside Parliament did lead to a scientific briefing by Sir Patrick Vallance and others. Disgracefully, none of the potential prime ministers were present and only 5% of peers and MPs chose to attend.Perhaps those who chose to stay environmentally illiterate could explain why their constituents' future well-being is so unimportant to them?
Susan Chapman
From: Soo Chapman <sooch...@hotmail.co.uk>
Sent: 14 July 2022 19:19
To: tobias.e...@parliament.uk <tobias.e...@parliament.uk>
Cc: bbcbre...@bbc.co.uk <bbcbre...@bbc.co.uk>; BBC <b...@bbc.co.uk>; womanshour...@bbc.co.uk <womanshour...@bbc.co.
Subject: The most predictable & preventable global crisis: Sir Patrick Vallance briefs MPs on climate science 11.7.22- link
Dear Tobias Ellwood,
Already we have baked in a deal of trouble for ourselves. Sir Patrick describes it as a Systems Problem. There is an extremely dangerous amount of carbon in our overheating atmosphere.
We need to prevent further accelerating damage and loss.
Professor Emily Shuckberg, one of Monday's speakers says, "Climate change is the most predictable and most preventable global crisis."
Further to our conversation about brave Angus Rose and his heroic 37 day hunger strike which meant that this presentation was possible I forward the link:
Please assure me you have seen this presentation. The natural world (including us) is being sacrificed to the fossil fuel and other deadly industries. Mass murder is now taking place.
Criminally, for fifty years the public has been lied to by an industry that knew it was causing great harm. Our world is only safe because humanity discovered the threats posed by the Whaling Industry (de-oxygenating oceans) and the CFC Industry (loss of ozone layer). Whopping lies were told.Luckily Greenpeace, the British Antarctic Survey and chemist Margaret Thatcher were awake!
But now most people are asleep. And yet we have multiple solutions to the crises being faced if we work together.
Carbon slides should have been shown at the same time as the covid slides in 2020. Our well-being is at enormous risk.
This Public Information Programme is well overdue, but strangely not yet alerting the badly disadvantaged public who will want to prevent the worst and to adapt to the harms ahead.
Please share to anyone that is interested and then to everyone that isn't!!!! All Hands on Deck.
It's deeply disgraceful and shocking that only 5% of MPs and Peers were at the briefing. Not one aspirant Conservative Leader. As the ecosystems that sustain life are unravelling!
Why are we to be led by environmental illiteracy? We deserve protection not just from monstrous humans but also from dangerous tipping points on our only home.
I look forward to hearing from you and our new Prime Minister with a robust, ambitious Project Drawdown Programme for our well-being.
Many thanks,
Susan Chapman (usual address)
Soo Chapman
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Sent: 23 July 2022 14:12
To: tobias.e...@parliament.uk <tobias.e...@parliament.uk>; environme...@bcpcouncil.gov.uk <environme...@bcpcouncil.gov.uk>
Cc: 1...@dorset.pnn.police.uk <1...@dorset.pnn.police.uk>; p...@dorset.pnn.police.uk <p...@dorset.pnn.police.uk>; in...@mind.org.uk <in...@mind.org.uk>
Subject: Public information for schools,forums, papers, libraries: Please address appalling absence of information on the climate/ biodiversity crises
Soo Chapman
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Dear Representatives and others,
Can we guarantee clean provenance of all resources as our planet burns?
It is provident Greenpeace we have to thank for the continuing oxygenation of the oceans after the disastrous whaling industry disturbed the symbiotic relationship between whale excreta, krill and phytoplankton. The latter makes up to 70% of our planetary oxygen.
Not that I've heard any concern about it by the prime ministerial candidates who don't seem to have understood the recent warnings of climate collapse from global scientists.
Please sign and share.
Many thanks,
Susan Chapman
In 2017, the Esperanza ship sailed through the waters of Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and the Republic of Congo during the ‘Give the Congo Basin forest a chance’ ship tour. During the tour, scientists confirmed the presence of peatlands. (Peatlands are a type of wetland critical for preventing and mitigating the effects of climate change while preserving biodiversity. Learn more here.)
A team of Congolese and UK tropical forest scientists, including Professor Simon Lewis and Dr Greta Dargie from the University of Leeds, UK, estimated that the peatlands of the central Congo Basin store some 30 billion metric tonnes of carbon. This amount of carbon is equivalent to three years of the world’s fossil fuel emissions.
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DRC’s Oil Minister, Didier Budimbu, announced that the auction covers 27 oil blocks and three gas fields, exceeding the government’s decision in April potentially without a legal mandate. The decision came only five months after signing a $500 million deal at the COP26 to help protect DRC’s forests with the Central African Forest Initiative (CAFI).
On a field trip earlier this month to four of the designated oil blocks, Greenpeace Africa’s forest campaigners collected testimonies from local communities who were shocked to learn about the prospective auction of their lands to oil companies. Some communities, such as those living around the Upemba national park, plan to resist the prospective oil exploration as it would be a direct threat to the lake they have relied on for generations. According to the International Energy Agency, any new fossil fuel project today would undermine reaching net-zero emissions by 2050, and this auction would be particularly toxic.
“The international community and the Congolese government must end the neocolonial scramble for African fossil fuels by restricting oil companies’ access to the DRC. The government should focus instead on ending energy poverty through supporting clean, decentralised renewable energy", added Irene Wabiwa.
It remains unclear which oil companies are planning to bid in the auction. In a petition launched by Greenpeace Africa with local and international partners, almost 100,000 people call on Congolese President Felix Tshisekedi not to sacrifice the rainforest to the oil industry.
We are urging the world’s largest oil and gas companies to sit out this major oil and gas auction in the DRC at the end of July.
Please add your name to our call to stop the sacrifice of Congo's rainforests to the oil industry. Click the button below to sign the petition. |
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Thanks for all that you do, |
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Lerato Tsotetsi Supporter Engagement Manager Greenpeace Africa |
Sent: 25 July 2022 19:31
Soo Chapman
Dear Representatives and others,
Letter sent to the bungling Beeb about their dereliction of duty.
A group of environmental organisations and campaigners have written to the BBC to rebuke it for inadequate questioning about the climate crisis during Monday’s Conservative leadership debate.
Just one question on the environment was asked in the debate, and it put the onus on individuals rather than leaders to act on the climate.
The candidates were asked: “What three things should people change in their lives to help tackle climate change faster?” Rishi Sunak put the emphasis on recycling while Liz Truss extolled the virtues of green technology.
In a letter, campaigners including the Springwatch presenter Chris Packham said this question was “completely irresponsible” as it focused “on individual action rather than governmental action, when the purpose of the debate was to test the candidates’ credentials for being the next prime minister”.
The letter, also signed by the World Wildlife Fund, Greenpeace and Green Alliance, said: “The purpose of a leaders’ debate is to interrogate our future prime minister on their policy positions for vital issues so the public can make an informed choice about which candidate will do the best job for their country. This question failed to provide them with those answers.
“For this to happen at a time when the cost of living is driving millions into poverty, largely driven by fossil fuel prices and rising energy bills, is unacceptable.”
During the debate, as much time was spent discussing Sunak’s expensive suits and shoes and Truss’s earrings as was spent on the climate crisis and the environment.
The letter calls on the BBC to improve its focus on the climate crisis in its leadership coverage in the next few weeks and to recognise that the question in the debate was inadequate and the time allocation was too short.It also asks the broadcaster to guarantee that in future leadership debates, including before general elections, the climate crisis will be treated as an issue of governmental rather than solely personal responsibility.
Dear Andrew Alexander,
Irresponsible climate coverage in leadership debate
We are writing to you about what we perceive to be irresponsible coverage of climate change in the televised Conservative Leadership debate, ‘Our Next Prime Minister’, with Rishi Sunak and Liz Truss, aired at 9pm on 25th July 2022.
We understand that there is pressure to cover all the issues that the public want answered by our future Prime Minister during a televised debate, but as a key issue for voters it is unacceptable that the climate crisis was framed as an issue solely for individuals, not the Government, and was skimmed over in just 2-3 minutes.
Candidates were asked ‘what three things should people change in their lives to help tackle climate change faster?’ The framing of this question is wholly inappropriate, not just because it relegates the issue of climate change below others in the show which were framed as ‘governmental issues’ but because it reinforces the idea that solving climate change is an individual responsibility, rather than one which requires a response from the Prime Minister and their ministers. For this to take place the week after record temperatures in the UK, and with firefighters having the ‘worst day since the blitz’ is far below the standards we would expect from the BBC.
The purpose of a leaders' debate is to interrogate our future Prime Minister on their policy positions for vital issues so the public can make an informed choice about which candidate will do the best job for their country - this question failed to provide them with those answers. For this to happen at a time when the cost of living is driving millions into poverty, largely driven by fossil fuel prices and rising energy bills, is unacceptable.
There is no shortage of substantive issues both candidates could have been challenged on, given their recent or current senior positions in a government that - according to both its own independent climate advisors and High Court judges - is comprehensively failing to produce plans able to meet its legally binding climate commitments. The BBC reported on both the Climate Change Committee (CCC) report and the High Court ruling - these could easily have been topics of debate.
We would like to hear a commitment that the BBC will improve their coverage of the climate crisis in subsequent leadership coverage in the next few weeks, at this critical time for our country. We ask for a recognition that the question in the debate was inadequate, and the time allocation was too short - and a guarantee that at future leadership debates, such as in the general election, climate change will be treated as an issue of governmental, not solely personal, responsibility.
Kind regards,
Signatories:
And locally:
Sent: 26 July 2022 09:19
GARY FINCH
regards, gary finch
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Soo Chapman
Sent: 27 July 2022 21:55
To: environme...@bcpcouncil.gov.uk <environme...@bcpcouncil.gov.uk>; tobias.e...@parliament.uk <tobias.e...@parliament.uk>; transi...@googlegroups.com <transi...@googlegroups.com>
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Subject: Re: [transition-bh] Groups Call Out Irresponsible Climate Coverage by BBC in Leadership Debate. Today's Echo letters.
Soo Chapman
UK government to hold back data on state of biodiversity in England
The Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs has confirmed it will publish a reduced set of biodiversity indicators this year
By Adam Vaughan
The UK government has quietly decided against publishing more than two-thirds of the metrics it uses to track the health of nature in England this year, including the state of bird populations and fish stocks. The decision comes just months before a landmark UN biodiversity summit in Canada.
New Scientist revealed last year that the UK government would pause reporting on all biodiversity indicators in 2022 to allow for a review taking account of new targets considered by the biodiversity summit.
The decision this week, published as a footnote on the website of the Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs (Defra), means that, in an apparent compromise, seven of the 24 annual indicators tracking English biodiversity will be published this year after all.
However, many of the omitted indicators, such as progress on tackling invasive species and the status of European habitats, previously showed a deteriorating natural environment.
Each indicator is composed of one or more measures scored on a traffic-light scale according to whether they are improving, showing little change or deteriorating. Among the indicators that will be skipped this year, 22 measures are green, six are amber and 19 are red, according to last year’s figures.
“This year’s limited set of indicators can’t cover up the story behind the numbers,” Richard Benwell at the Wildlife and Countryside Link coalition told the ENDS Report, which first reported last week’s update. “Instead of rapid progress toward the recovery of species and habitats, we find that sites and species continue to decline.”
Conservationist Mark Avery, co-founder of non-profit organisation Wild Justice, says: “Defra is failing to tackle wildlife loss and so it has decided to bury the evidence. This is a department with no shame.”
The naturalist and broadcaster Chris Packham says: “Cherry-picking which ones is just cowardice. Claiming that they need a pause at a time of absolute crisis, that’s like saying we’ll stand down the fire brigade in the middle of the Blitz so we can pull ourselves together and think about what we’re doing. It’s ludicrous. I think principally it’s because the news that will emerge is bad news.”
The indicators to be published this year are global biodiversity impacts, air pollution, protected areas, butterflies, pollinating insects, biodiversity expenditure and status of priority species.
In a statement, Defra said: “To enable Defra to do a necessary review, we are publishing a core set this year. But no data will be lost, it will all be published [in 2023].”
Between 5 and 17 December, Canada will host the UN biodiversity summit in Montreal to thrash out a new deal on arresting the decline in nature worldwide, including a series of targets for 2030. Countries have previously fallen far short of targets set for 2020.
Sign up to Wild Wild Life, a free monthly newsletter celebrating the diversity and science of animals, plants and Earth’s other weird and wonderful inhabitants
More on these topics:
- BIODIVERSITY
- WILDLIFE
- NATURE decline by 2025 to avoid dangerous climate change
‘We have the tools and knowhow required to limit warming,’ says IPCC chair Hoesung Lee
The “now or never” call to action from the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), published on Monday, also urged for emission levels to be slashed in half by 2030.
At a press conference, UN secretary-general Antonio Guterres called investing in new infrastructure relating to fossil fuels, which are behind the continuing rise in planet-heating greenhouse gases, “moral and economic madness”.
Sent: 27 July 2022 18:41