“Candidates are ignoring Climate Change in the TV election debates” say Ealing Friends of the Earth. “Politicians are scared to tell us that if we buy a huge car to get around London, the emissions from its manufacture and use mean more crop failures, more drought and more extreme heat.”
The environmental group points out that many Ealing residents have family connections to parts of the world that have been engulfed in deadly heatwaves during the last few weeks, but politicians in the UK – and abroad – are ignoring the dangers of a rapidly heating world.
Over 500 deaths are reported this week in Pakistan as temperatures soared above 40C. It’s only 5 weeks since Pakistan had to shut schools in most parts of the country to protect children from heatstroke and dehydration during the last bout of extreme heat, which also affected India where 37 cities recorded temperature over 45 degrees Celsius with Delhi ‘unbearable’ at nearly 50C.
Elsewhere, over 1,300 died during this year’s Hajj pilgrimage, with temperatures in Saudi Arabia exceeding 50C. A deadly heatwave scorched Mexico, Central America and the southern US during June. Southern Europe, China and Africa have also been hit, and here in the UK the mercury reached 30C this week – way over the normal June maximum of 22C. This heat is not just deadly to humans, it affect plants and animals, causes droughts and wildfires, and threatens agriculture and food supplies.
None of this should come as surprise. Scientists and the UN have been warning of the existential danger from cataclysmic global heating for over 30 years and it’s happening even faster that they feared. Yet candidates have barely mentioned the issue in the TV election debates. Some even want to make things worse by burning more of the fossil fuels that create the problem.
We are in this crisis because there are more humans consuming more stuff than ever before in history – stuff whose production causes climate destroying emissions. It is understandable that people want to drive and fly, and these days it feels very normal to do so. However it is not ‘normal’. Mass motoring is only a few decades old and nowhere near universal, and 80% of the world’s population have never been on a plane. The emissions generated by the world adopting these and other consumption habits, are devastating.
This does not mean blaming anyone or asking people to adopt a hair-shirt existence. But tackling the crisis does mean facing reality, and working out together what is the best and most comfortable lifestyle we can devise that is sustainable and does not destroy our planet.
Recently we remembered those who gave their lives on D-Day 80 years ago. The climate crisis may demand a sacrifice from us, if we want our children and grandchildren to have a future – though not of our lives – merely support for a reduction in how much we consume as a society. In fact the changes needed will mean cleaner air, safer & quieter towns and using our legs more, which will make us fitter and in all probability happier. Whoever wins the election, Ealing Friends of the Earth will continue to highlight the UN’s warning that the world is on the verge of a climate abyss, and press for urgent action by our political leaders.
