‘Time to Act’ 2015
Anne Miller
We now know that rather than the coalition everyone was expecting, we will have a Conservative led government for a second parliamentary term. We’ll also have a new MP for Cambridge in Daniel Zeichner (Labour), who beat Julian Huppert (LibDem) by just 599 votes.
Some may be disappointed by this, others will be relieved, but whatever your political leanings, some things transcend politics, and it’s important to keep them that way: Loving your children, behaving ethically, caring about climate change. All are concerns of both Right and Left.
However, with a right of centre government in power, its particularly important to make sure that environmental issues are addressed in a way that engages the right, which may mean subtle tweaks in the way things are expressed by those with different political preferences. COIN have written an excellent guide on this: “How to talk climate change with the centre-right”
There’s still a lot of work to do to get the political action we need on climate change, but there are also reasons to be cheerful.
The Church is joining in. The Church of England has got rid of its investments in the dirtiest fossil fuels, and the Vatican is urging politicians to take action on climate change.
The financial sector is joining in. The divestment movement is a growing moral challenge for fossil fuel companies, but there is also growing concern amongst big investors about the investment risk of the highest carbon projects, and this is putting pressure on fossil fuel companies to adapt to a carbon constrained world. For example, in mid-April, 98 percent of BP’s shareholders voted in favor of an initiative that would force the company to disclose which of its assets would become “unburnable” in a low-carbon world.
We’re making progress, but it’s important to keep up the pressure.
The next opportunity to do this is the mass lobby of new MPs in Westminster on Wednesday 17 June. There will be a group going from Cambridge to lobby our new Cambridge MP, Daniel Zeichner. More details on the lobby here, and on the Cambridge plans here. Do signup and pass the word.
Anne Miller is an innovator by background and Director of The Creativity Partnership where she helps organisations get value from their creativity. She was on the board of the national Climate Coalition 2005-2010, has 39 patents and wrote the book “How to get your ideas developed (and change the world).
