Excerpt from article published in Kuranda Paper, May 2019

The world's children are shaming us into action on Climate Change- and the students in the region are part of this mass movement. We congratulate them on their commitment and courage on this urgent issue.

Next event: School Strike For Climate Friday the 3rd of May, 9.00 to 10.30am outside Warren Entsch's office, Mulgrave Rd.

The School Strike 4 Climate say more action needed

Excerpt from article published in Kuranda Paper, April 2019

300 people attended the School Strike 4 Climate in Cairns on the 15th of March joining with an estimated million and half people in over a 100 different countries around the world in a global day of demonstrations.

These strikes have grown from the action started by Swedish student Greta Thunberg who began her strike on her own last year outside the Swedish Parliament, to let her government know they weren’t doing enough to protect this generation and future generations from climate changing pollution.  She told them “I want you to act as if your house is on our fire”.

In Australia alone 150.000 thousand attended rallies in 55 cities and regional centres. They spoke that our government are ignoring the gravity of a humanitarian crisis from the ill effects of climate change. The droughts, bushfires, storms, the rising seas and the destruction of the Reef, with 2019 smashing through the record set for being the hottest summer and year on record.

It is not only the changing climate they were concerned about, but the pollution that is changing our climate is also poisoning our air. The latest report from the European Heart Journal found that 8.8 million people died from air pollution around the world in 2015, which is more than from tobacco smoking.

The Strike issued three demands to the government.

1.To stop the proposed Adani coal mine.

1. No new coal or gas projects and

3.100% renewable energy by 2030.

They held signs saying such things as “Sorry I can’t go to school today because I have to save the world”. “Inactive Government = Student Activism’. “We stand for what we stand on.”

They chanted slogans as they marched through Cairns to the local government offices, “Stopping pollution is the best solution”. “Climate change is not a lie, we won’t let the planet die”. “No more coal, no more oil. Keep the carbon in the soil”.

Many expressed the strong conviction that the fate of the planet depends on them and that the government must aim higher on the climate. Prime Minister Scott Morrison however called for, “more schooling, less activities”. For those wanting to get involved in more activities, local groups CAFNEC and Stop Adani Cairns are also running ongoing campaigns too.

In early October, yet another science report was released by the World’s leading climate body, the IPCC, confirming that climate change is well underway, and that under current estimates warming will reach 1.5 degrees in the next few decades.

An increase of 1.5 degrees Celsius will make the climate much more unstable; bigger storms and cyclones, harsher droughts and heat waves.

However, 2.0 degrees hotter is much, much worse and would cause very serious social, economic, and environmental problems. Destruction of coral reefs, rising sea levels, collapsing food supplies are all real and happening now.

Limiting warming to 1.5 degrees would require a complete reduction of greenhouse gasses to zero by 2050 or sooner.

This requires fundamental change to energy, agriculture, transport systems and pretty much everything that humans do – and on a global scale. A few solar panels and wind farms is only a start.

But we all know this – scientists have been telling us with increasing alarm for decades that the planet is getting cooked – and we, its inhabitants, are facing a very uncertain and unstable future. The IPCC report is optimistic that governments across the world will see the light and quickly move to phase out fossil fuels and start planning to adapt to the uncertain future.

Unfortunately, this optimism seems misguided. The Paris Climate Agreement signed in 2016 will not limit global warming to 1.5 degrees – actually it will do very little because the commitments are too weak and the United States has run away.

Most governments and industry either don’t care or far worse are staging a huge deception campaign to undermine climate science, and any real efforts to limit greenhouse emissions.

The public has been duped by the likes of the coal and oil industry, by their slick marketing companies, and by dodgy scientists and lobby groups funded by these interests. For example, Tony Abbott and his colleagues have happily pushed the coal industry’s agenda, undermining energy reform and dumping real climate action.

These people and the industries they support are a minority, holding humanity to ransom for their own political or financial gain. Let’s stop being hoodwinked by big industry and demand immediate and far reaching action to reduce greenhouse emissions to zero.

ACTION:To move Australia beyond fossil fuels, the climate movement must grow to an unprecedented scale and size. Join FoE Australia's Tipping Point team of national volunteers: email info@tippingpoint.org.au to find out more.