THE calls this week for the Scottish Greens to stand aside in the election have been something else. Just imagine, if the SNP had heeded Labour calls to stand aside

in 1979 to keep the Tories out, they wouldn’t be the party they are today.

This is the first General Election since the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change gave us just a decade to reverse global warming. Since then, how many political parties in Scotland have woken up to the fact that we need to start the transition away from fossil fuels right now, to create jobs and protect our future? How many of them are prepared to significantly realign our economy to address the biggest crisis facing us?

None of them, apart from the Greens. That’s why it is absurdly entitled to question why we are standing now, of all times. Resistance is necessary.

When Donald Trump was elected as President of the United States, the resistance was led by Teen Vogue and a rogue National Parks twitter account.

Now, as corporations and oil companies use government subsidies to expand their planet-boiling businesses of oil and gas extraction, driving up use of motor vehicles and aviation, the resistance is being led by teenage activists.

READ MORE: Scottish Greens won't join Remain coalitions in General Election

Will we see resistance in the UK to the Machiavellian levels of dishonesty, diversion and distortion of Boris Johnson, or the dead-eyed disdain for normal people from Jacob Rees-Mogg? The Westminster opposition parties are not providing it. They are incapable of providing it, because they are welded into the same stale Westminster framework, unable, or unwilling, to think outside of it.

They seek power for power’s sake, unwilling to cooperate with others even in the face of existential threats to the future. It seems increasingly certain that Brexit will bring an end to the UK as it is, and Westminster is seemingly unwilling to stop it.

That’s fine, but other existential threats to our existence are also being enabled. Nuclear proliferation remains the policy of the UK-wide parties, and Westminster also seems unwilling to act to address the climate emergency, a crisis which in only a few decades is set to see sea levels rise, infrastructure crumble and even could see temperatures rise above liveable levels.

They cannot complain of a lack of warnings. This week, a major new report from 11,000 scientists around the world called for governments to take more radical action to address the climate emergency. It must be a wake-up call to the UK and Scottish Governments. It showed the “clear and unequivocal” evidence that we are in an emergency, and explicitly confirmed that radical action is needed.

It also showed why it is absurd to suggest the Greens should stand aside in the General Election in such circumstances. Scottish Greens need a voice at a UK level for exactly this reason. At that level, the resistance, when it comes, must seek to break the stale, dysfunctional framework, to modernise the democratic settlement. It must be the exact opposite of the Trump-Boris reality television show, with its blatant mistruths and its “now you see it now you don’t” policy making.

READ MORE: Scottish Greens focus on climate crisis in General Election campaign

Look at the hastily announced “ban” on fracking from the Tories. The very next day they admitted it was a temporary position until after the election.

Look at the platitudes spoken in defence of the NHS, only for it later to be revealed that Conservative candidates were told not to sign up to specific pledges on protecting the NHS from privatisation and trade deals.

Incidentally, tackling the climate emergency was also on the no-go list.

There’s an old saying that the wealthy and powerful won’t allow you to vote away their wealth and power, that they will keep changing the rules of the game, that they will lie and cheat and ultimately resort to violence, before they will give it up. Well, let’s see about that.

Our current politics is incapable of dealing with the problems that we are facing. While our media are distracted by the circus, equalities legislation is under attack, the NHS is struggling to cope and under threat, and millions are suffering the indignities, hunger and cold that come from being the victims of austerity the Universal Credit scheme.

Our Scottish Green New Deal is designed to provide the solutions. It is an act of resistance to upend the old order and to put the priorities of our governments back in line with the priorities of people.

Instead of toothless and powerless councils being forced to deliver decline, while private operators make a fast profit from what were once public services such as buses and trains, we need to rebuild our public sector to take back what has been lost. We need to give councils the power to make things happen again.

We need the public sector to play a much more active role in keeping our homes warm, keeping us healthy and building our future. And yes, only with such an ambitious plan can we face up to the urgency of this climate crisis. That’s why I hope we see some acts of rebellion at this general election. I hope people can see that they can speak loudly and firmly to the parties of the status quo, by using their vote.