JOE Biden has already had an impact on the global efforts to tackle the climate emergency in the short time we have left. When the US President calls the next 10 years "a decisive decade" it’s a bit of an understatement – 2030 is the deadline set by the international Paris Agreement by which we need to put global warming in reverse, so we are running out of time.
Will there be a bold Glasgow Agreement at COP26 later this year? Only if world leaders take this seriously. It’s bad enough that Boris Johnson arrived at these latest talks armed only with a set of targets and no political will to meet them. But what was even worse was the way he talked about them.
“It's vital for all of us to show that this is not all about some expensive, politically correct, green act of bunny hugging,” he smirked. Except no-one laughed. After all, the world leaders were there to discuss how to secure the survival of our species.
Gillian Mackay, Scottish Green lead candidate for Central Scotland
How utterly embarrassing to be represented on the world stage by such a sneering, self-entitled man who refuses to recognise the stakes of the climate crisis. And people wonder why the Scottish Greens support independence for Scotland.
The Scottish Green manifesto does talk about investing billions in a green recovery, but Johnson is ridiculous to call that expensive, when the alternative is complete climate breakdown. By investing in our future now, we save money and more importantly lives in the long run.
When Johnson says "politically correct" what he means is fair. A green recovery should leave no one behind – not the millions who have suffered under his cruel austerity economics, not the refugees fleeing climate breakdown in the global south who face his racist immigration policies, not the oil and gas workers who must transition to low carbon jobs. Boris Johnson fails them all, and instead provides handouts or public contracts to his friends.
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Look at the Scottish Conservative manifesto. They want to cut taxes for Scotland’s most wealthy and call it a “recovery” from the pandemic. Maybe it’s time for some politically correct policies, because otherwise you need a direct line to Johnson’s WhatsApp to get a break.
We need the green action that Johnson mocks, and we need it urgently. And as for bunny hugging, we are in a nature emergency too. The decline in species around the world is happening at an alarming pace. In Scotland, one in nine of our native species is at risk, and the decline shows no sign of slowing.
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Boris Johnson may think that is a joke, but we are part of that ecosystem too. Their survival is intrinsically linked with our survival. The Scottish Greens take our survival seriously. That’s why we secured marine protected areas off Scotland’s coasts. That’s why we saw off developers at iconic sites like Loch Lomond and Coul Links. It’s why we forced the Scottish Government to protect the mountain hare and why we secured a new nature restoration fund at the last budget.
While the SNP may take a better tone than Boris Johnson and clearly recognise the stakes in this, they cannot continue to hide behind eye-catching targets. With the timescale we have, it is no good to set ambitious targets only to fail to meet them. Tackling the climate and nature emergencies we face requires urgent action, and only the Scottish Greens have the solutions take that action in the time we have left. That’s why we need to vote like our future depends on it on May 6.
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