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Guest essay by Eric Worrall
According to Bloomberg, despite obvious indications Londoners are fed up, London hasn’t tried hard enough to reduce CO2 emissions to earn a pass from further Extinction Rebellion disruption.
Extinction Rebellion Is Right to Target London
Andrea Leadsom shouldn’t be so complacent about the U.K.’s performance on climate change. The recent data have been troubling.By Lara Williams
18 October 2019, 16:30 GMT+10London’s Extinction Rebellion, the undeniably effective local offshoot of the global environmental protest group, has been out in force again this week, shutting down streets in the financial district and disrupting flights from City Airport. Its so-called Autumn Uprising has led to more than 1,600 arrests, and provoked some very angry commuters. People from Greta Thunberg to Stanley Johnson, the British prime minister’s dad, have lent their support.
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This year the U.K. became the first major economy to legislate a commitment to net-zero carbon emissions by 2050. It has also made great strides in the past few decades in slashing carbon emissions — by 42% since 1990.
These are welcome developments, but the future is starting to look a little dim. The government’s own projections have the U.K. missing its 2023 and 2028 carbon budgets (the name for its emissions targets) by quite a margin, as the chart below shows. These targets weren’t even aimed at getting to net-zero emissions by 2050 (the U.K. only had an 80% reduction in mind when they were set), so that hardly bodes well.
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While this stalling on climate action is no doubt a symptom of a government distracted by Brexit, that’s no excuse. The U.K. is hosting the UN climate summit next year and if it’s serious about being a leader on the environment, it needs to make a success of it. Overshooting legally-binding carbon budgets doesn’t set a great example.
You may not agree with their tactics, but it’s hard to argue that Extinction Rebellion should be rabble-rousing somewhere else.
Read more: https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-10-18/extinction-rebellion-is-right-to-protest-climate-action-in-london
In Britain the green movement has won. Britain has a Conservative government which seems genuinely committed to serious investment in renewables.
Britain has unequivocally committed to dismantling their industrial age fossil fuel energy infrastructure, even though the new green infrastructure which is meant to replace fossil fuel hasn’t been built yet.
But none of this is enough. The green movement’s response to this overwhelming victory is to upset ordinary people, and to insult what is likely the greenest government the world has ever seen, for not trying hard enough.
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If XR didn’t exist, evil Big Oil capitalists would have to find them.
Enough climate scams !
It happens and continental media bravely avoids it. On youtube search for #Boerenactie .
Netherlands farmers mean it. No wonder media mute and obfuscate the topic.
An explanation of why Extinction Rebellion should not target Londonm and why Bloomberg are out of order, they should know better
London Underground Recent History. How quickly we forget!
On 7th July 2005 52 people lost their lives to Jehadi Terrorist Bombers on the Tube, travelling to work.
On 21st July 2005 4 failed terrorist bomb attempts were made on passsengers going to work.
On the 22nd July 2005 the Metropolitan Police shot dead an innocent Brazilian Man on the Tube as they wrongly identified him as a fugitive bomber from the day before.
Summer 2015 anti terrorist police prevented a repeat attack on the Underground by Jehadi Bombers (to mark the 10th anniversary)
I was on the Tube those days, but I still carried on doing my job. I would imagine the London staff at Bloomberg, at the time, were involved and knew people who got injured or killed.
Travelling on the Tube to work is stressful, you are always on your guard, with half an eye for anything suspicious. Along come the idiots from Extinction Rebellion, (who the BBC et al encourage by the constant clamour of “climate emergency”), climb on the Trains, your instinct would only perceive this as a threat, I am surprised they only got punched and kicked, the Brazilian man got shot 3 times in the head!
This is the fault of idiots in the media like Bloomberg, and the fault of every media luvvie and political idiot who supports XR. Including Stanley Johnson, who I always thought was a bit of an bumbling fool but now has removed all doubt!
Good point John, I was on the Northern Line on July 7th, though thankfully not on one of the trains which was bombed. Everyone was well paranoid after that.
I have no problem accommodating extinction rebellion, provided they go the wall (for execution) first. Then we can look down at their fallen bodies and “think of it as evolution in action”.