Greedy firms must be punished for crimes against our climate

Jill Bruce and I have written for the Gazette for a year now - that is 52 articles on climate change and the environment.

I hope they have not seemed like 52 bossy sermons telling you how to live your life.

But the choices we make every day, even small ones like reusing a plastic bag all matter very much.

If we don’t do our best we set the wrong example to our family, our community, our work colleagues and the younger generation.

We are all role models. We can’t be perfect but we can do better or do badly.

I felt alarmed and saddened by a respected authority’s reaction to the announcement that atmospheric carbon is still rising uncontrollably.

As I waited for the toast to pop up and listened to the Today programme he said we have all the understanding and technology we need to achieve a net zero carbon world by 2050 but he believes what will defeat us is selfishness, greed and apathy.

Three basic human characteristics will eventually wipe us out.

Selfishness: Carrying on as we are because it suits us and we don’t care what damage we do to others.

Those coming after us will probably see the level of the world’s oceans 40forty feet higher by the end of the century.

Various island nations will be wiped out in the next decade, a little later on cities like Calcutta go underwater while flood defences such as we have never seen before will have to defend London - or the city has to be moved - and much of Holland will be gone.

The selfishness is summed up by people who say: “Why should I worry, I’ll be dead and gone before it happens...not my problem.”

Greed: We can’t take more and more out of our planet.

It is not going to grow to meet our greed.

We can’t plunder its resources to the point where we exterminate so many species the system collapses.

We depend on them, they depend on their habitats and the food chains that feed them and all sorts of interactions that are the result of thousands of years of evolution and adaptation, creating all life from one-celled organisms in the sludge of oceans.

Now the human brain has 100 billion and the human race has 8 billion times

100 billion which ought to be enough if we use them properly.

Greed is what stops us living sustainably.

Apathy: It means let’s just not bother our heads about it.

Something will come along and save us.

Or: “I feel better with my head in the sand so I am keeping it there thank you very much, and I’d be grateful if you’d stop boring me with climate change.”

Some people are objecting to how it is taking over the media, the new Brexit they say.

My son says the human race knows what is happening but are like people in a house on fire who can’t decide who should use the fire extinguisher so the house burns down and they are all goners, just as we will be if we don’t stop arguing about whose fault climate change is and what we are going to do about it.

So what it is in a nutshell is a race against time, selfishness, greed and apathy.

Well done that spokesman. I may have forgotten his name, cannot forget his words.

Next week I promise to write more cheerfully about how we can have a really good Christmas - a happy and sustainable one!

Laurel Spooner

Climate change campaigner

Laurel’s article is very thought provoking. If it is just our attitude to the climate crisis that is preventing us from taking the necessary actions, then surely this is something we can change?

Are we really too selfish, greedy and apathetic to care whether the sea rises by 9 metres in the next 80 years, in the lifetime of our schoolchildren, with all the disastrous consequences of major cities having to be evacuated?

I believe most of us want to help others, and we especially want to help, and protect, young children.

We are happy to share; look at how much was raised by the BBC Children in Need campaign.

We are busy, but apathetic? No, I believe the problem is that old one “he who keeps his head when all about are losing theirs is just not aware of the situation”.

Laurel and I, and many other climate campaigners, have a great interest in the natural world, so we seek out newspaper articles, magazines, books, TV and radio programmes on that topic, and what we have seen, heard and read over the last few years has astonished and frightened us.

Other people have other interests, sport, fashion, the arts, all kinds of topics, but they are not looking for, and finding, all the information on the climate crisis that Laurel, I and others are.

Can we change the “selfish, greedy and apathetic” into caring and enthusiastic climate campaigners?

Yes, look at how our attitude to plastic has changed since David Attenborough showed us the problem.

All we have to do is find a way to help everyone see what is happening. We can watch those programmes, read those articles, and ask everyone we know to do the same.

Let them know how important it is, and just like a good advertising campaign, keep on nudging and nudging at them till they start nudging their friends too.

It is important, of course, to be sure what we see and hear

is coming from reputable sources.

The Gazette recently published a letter “Climate crisis is complete fallacy” which based this astonishing assertion on a Professor Berkhout, who works in the fossil fuel industry, and whose claims have been dismissed by the scientific community.

Hopefully most people can see through that kind of self interest.

I’ve seen many excellent public information campaigns over the years, on Keep Britain Tidy, drink driving, stopping smoking, organ donation and much more.

Why do none of the party manifestos commit to telling everyone the climate crisis is happening, and what needs to be done?

Why is the climate crisis not taught routinely in all schools?

Of course there are a few selfish, greedy and apathetic people, they steal and destroy what hardworking people have created.

We expect them to be punished for their crimes.

World leaders are already punished for war crimes, we can hope that soon there will be laws to ensure selfish and greedy companies are properly punished for their crimes against our climate.

Those laws won’t be drafted by Governments who are apathetic on the climate emergency.

We urgently need a Government who will care for our climate and our future. The Time is Now. Use your vote.

Jill Bruce

Lead Climate Ambassador, Essex Federation of Women’s Institutes