Appendix 2: Notes from our Climate Matters meeting in Oxford:

Our Climate Matters meeting in the Wesley Memorial Church, Oxford, on September 18th.

Duncan Enright, Labour District Councillor, chaired the meeting. He welcomed an audience of some 102 and introduced the speakers: Lord Deben, Roz Savage MP and Dr Pete Sudbury.

Dr Subury spoke first. He began by reminding us that Churchill said, "Those that fail to learn from history are destined to repeat it". A saying recently reframed as "History doesn't repeat itself, but it rhymes".

He took us back to 1972, when the Club of Rome and MIT build "World 3" an interactive computer model of the global economy. This model and report – the famous Limits to Growth - predicted a catastrophic collapse in the second half of this century, partly due to consumption of resources but also due to exponentially increasing pollution. Re-running the model 20 and 40 years on revealed it to be ominously accurate. Another predictive source was Rockstrom’s work on planetary boundaries. We’re dangerously crossing these in 7 of the 9 domains surveyed. Planetary boundaries are the dashboard of the Limits to Growth, and the lights are flashing red.

Dr Sudbury quoted Bobby Kennedy, who spoke about our worship of economic growth, and GDP as our shorthand for success and political holy grail. Kennedy listed things GDP doesn't measure — “the health of our children, the quality of their education, the joy of their play … the beauty of our poetry, the strength of our marriages … the integrity of our public officials.” He finished by saying that GDP: “measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it can tell us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans.”

Limits to Growth was received with alarm and enthusiasm from scientists, environmentalists and progressive thinkers, but most reaction was hostile. Economists argued that markets and technological innovation would prevent disaster. Fossil fuel companies derided it. Politicians largely avoided it. Neo-liberal market economics, with its ‘fiduciary duty’ to maximise shareholder returns, funnelled GDP disproportionately into the pockets of the wealthy who overwhelmed the media and politics itself, smothering challenge. Today, ‘bad actors’ in fossil fuel industries spend billions undermining science and corrupting politics.

So: why are politicians not acting? Because the forces of darkness are very strong. War is waged against Ed Miliband by the billionaire-owned press. The most environmentally destructive industries of all time attack renewable energy and the ‘green agenda’. The lie that this agenda causes high energy prices is everywhere and even our own government endorses it.

That surely leads us to ask:

What changes, what confluence of circumstances will it take to allow politicians to step up to the plate.

There are 3 things.

First: The "Bad Actors" need to start losing their power. Fossil fuel sales are stagnating and will fall, whilst the new industries grow exponentially, so the profits, the jobs, the lobbyists, the "donations" to political parties come increasingly from a different place and politicians are emboldened to back the industries of the future.

Second: The clamour of voices calling for change must broaden. Scientists and eco-warriors can be dismissed as special interest groups. But when, well, "boring" people like actuaries and insurers begin shouting...that's different. The Society and Faculty of Actuaries "Climate Scorpion" paper savages the risk management failures in climate policies, with phrases such as "a worse risk of catastrophic outcomes than Russian Roulette", Insurers are withdrawing from whole markets (try getting fire insurance in California). Gunther Thallinger, from Allianz Insurers, describes the inevitability of "whole asset classes becoming worthless" (beach-front property, anybody?) and says that at Nordhaus's optimum 3C of warming, there will be no insurance (too expensive), no government backstop (too broke) and no ability to adapt (far too much to shift effectively). That inability to pool or avoid risk results in the collapse of capitalism as we know it.

Third: The destruction needs to get worse. Global problems are "somewhere else". It only hits home when we realise we ourselves are in the firing line. And, already, nowhere is safe: The Town of Ashville in North Carolina was regularly listed among the 10 safest places from climate change in the US: 1000ft up, 300 miles from the coast, cool climate. Along came Hurricane Helene and washed large sections of it away: nobody had flood insurance, because it doesn't flood there. HELP! That threat resonates in homes, communities, shops, businesses, Councils, company boardrooms, industries; it influences decisions. People act, and demand others back them. Globally, over 85% of people fear climate change and think govt's need to do more, but they don't realise they're a majority such is the power of the smokescreen of lies from the media.

And one day, even billionaires will work out that you can't eat dust, and you can't breathe smoke.

And while the soft waves, gently breaking,

seem here no fateful inch to gain

Far back, through creeks and inlets making,

Comes swiftly, flooding in, the Main.

Human beings are amazing. We are in so much trouble because we've been amazingly good at doing the wrong things. We are the most creative species that ever existed: When the Ukraine crisis hit, the Germans built 5 LNG terminals in a year. It ‘normally’ takes 10y to build one: imagine when that transcendent focus turns to tackling egregious resource use and rampant pollution.

Leading the way is China, with a third of all emissions, a third of global industrial production. China is global leader in EVs, Batteries, Solar, Wind and in reforesting 5% of its land area in 10 years. They will peak their emissions 5 years early. Their green tech exports alone held back global emissions by 1% last year.

The EU Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism comes into effect next January.

The Spanish Government has just gone Full Metal Jacket on climate action.

The Innovation Zero conference, in London showcases hundreds of companies and whole industries driving forward sustainability, the mechanisms for getting $3Tn a year into the energy transition.

And not through Eastern windows only,

When daylight comes, comes in the light.

In front, the sun climbs slow, how slowly

But Westward, Look! The land is bright.

 Gaya Herrington, reviewing Limits to Growth at 50y, said "In a sustainable world, humanity consciously lets go of growth as its goal, replacing it with resource efficiency, pollution abatement and health and education services…We can do that in the real world, too".

Yes, We Can. And We Will.

Roz Savage MP spoke next.

She reminded us that she’d rowed across three oceans (Pacific, Atlantic and Indian) and explained that she wanted to draw attention to our destructive behaviours affecting nature and our climate itself. As an MP she introduced the CAN Bill. We have a choice. We have time. We could build a sustainable future, but our political systems and their unhelpful incentives got in the way.

Politics as a system is wired to fail us on a sustainable future. It prioritises false economies - short term gains are often much more politically attractive than longer term initiatives. The Government has kicked the CAN Bill down the road. There isn’t a willingness to grasp the nettle. The CAN Bill showed the perverse power of tribal politics. Climate and nature are too important to succumb to politics, but politicians fear the headlines and feel the need to spin and dissimulate. Politics is presently rejecting net zero and the political spectrum is getting distorted.

With maybe up to five parties of important size in competition, the first past the post system is at risk of throwing up anomalous results. This is dangerous! We need some form of proportional representation to more truly reflect voters’ wishes.

Things are more positive at the grass root level. There are many examples of cooperative efforts at the local level through which people see, and get, the benefit of ‘green’ initiatives. There are many projects seeking to build in climate resilience, for example regenerative farming.

How might we future proof ‘green’ initiatives (and legislation) against the possibility of a hostile government? We need both (a) policy environment enabling longer term incentives and (b) a bottom up approach at local level. We need a clear vision of where we are and what must be done.

Lord Deben spoke next.

We need to ask ourselves what we have to do, as climate activists, to better communicate.

Oxford has some good examples of what those who are elected can do. Our representatives have got to be pressurised by us to do the right thing. Many politicians don’t understand what climate change means! None are fully accepting the important moment we have reached. We may not be able to do anything effective if we keep putting it off. We all have to go and see our local MP. We have to educate ourselves and then educate them.

We’ve got to talk in language everyone understands eg dropping terminology which is obscure - like ‘net zero’. We should talk in terms everyone immediately understands, like a better society, cleaner air, a safer future, lower energy prices, warmer homes which are cheaper to run - these are things people can connect with. We must use the language of the people not of science and politics.

We need to recognise that we all have a part to play. We all matter. We must look at the things we are already doing. How can we make these a means of making a cleaner world? What can we do if we bothered actually to do it? We all have a part to play and should set an example. He urged us all, in this context, to read the late Pope’s encyclical Pope’s encyclical Laudato si. We have to put right what we’ve done wrong and help others to do it as well. We must recognise every time we have an opportunity, and we should take it.

Ed Miliband, he said, is doing a good job. Government is doing a lot right and not a lot wrong. Party politics is an issue but we have to praise politicians when they get it right. That’s the way we move forward.

Duncan Enright thanked the speakers and moved on to questions from the audience.

This section is in note form.

1. Raising the profile of climate change across the political spectrum – how to get it into the spotlight?

PS - Give it back its salience. Get a group to go with you and move forward. Talk more. Most are with you.

RS - it is a challenge. Tim Jackson influenced her. Show appreciation for those who do get it right. Needs to be more education. Needs to be at heart of every department.

LD - Working with The Grantham Institute. They will produce a website where people can see what their MP thinks of climate change. Working with the FoE to see what is going on in the local area. Telling you what the candidate thinks. Move climate into decision making when casting their role. Make people step up to the mark. Got to be careful of how we get people to make the right decisions. Solar panels should be on every roof. Solar farms are needed now and can be removed later. People are not good when it comes to initiatives in own area eg solar farms.

RS - nature is an easier sell than climate. [all three panelists agreed]

2. Senior politicians often claim not to understand climate change! Should CPD be made compulsory for politicians?

LD - Yes - but they won’t do it!

RS – There should be a parliamentary knowledge system. CPD is an excellent idea.

PS - Medical professionals are struck off if don’t do their CPD. Politicians should.

3. The Welsh Senedd is legislating to enforce honesty in politics – should Parliament do the same?

PS – Imagine politics without lies! Would be great to have those standards. Interesting to see how it would work. Would make a difference.

RS – The Welsh already have the Wellbeing of Future Generations (Wales) Act of 2015. Parliament has the Nolan principles. Aspiration - raise standards. How would it be enforced? Would require a culture change.

LD - most MPs are there to do the best. Papers pick on individuals. Many people have high standards. Support the highest.

4. China, an autocratic regime, has invested heavily in green technologies. Would you agree that they are responding better than democracies? How can the apparatus of democracy be made more fit for purpose?

RS - how can we reconcile short term democracy with long term goals?

PS - need the right dictator! Chinese are streets ahead.

LD - George Osborne made the large, green decision to go for off shore wind. China recognises what is happening and is in a position to benefit. There are now more electric charging stations than petrol stations.

5. We are seeing climate protesters arrested - what are you views on people being criminalised?

LD - Need some restrictions but have to be sensible. We have gone too far the other way now. Some do go in order to make trouble.

RS - People protest is good. Grateful to XR.

PS - Assault on protest is frightening.

6. It is possible that Reform will take a lead in Government. How can we make sure progress is not reversed?

PS - Ed Miliband is being attacked. If he is successful it punctures their lie that electric and gas prices are due to green initiatives. They need to stop him.

LD – In favour of Ed Miliband. Two movements: Reform say ‘it is all dangerous’ and the position taken by the Tories: we believe it, but we can’t do it as quickly as we’ve been told to.

RS - There is a sense in the country that we need change. Opportunity to speak to people about change but positively. Danger we get the ‘wrong’ change (see Brexit) - Reform is proof of that process. Must win hearts, minds and wallets. Community led projects one way to do this. Need PR system.

7. What would it take to raise climate change above party or generational politics?

RS - Party politics should not play a part.

PS - Under skin almost everyone agrees.

LD - Climate Change Act was cross-party initiative. There is a weakening climate coalition but how to maintain common approach?

Duncan Enright brought the evening to a close and thanked the speakers. He made two points: (1) Remind everyone that people go into politics to make change and (2) Recognise when good things happen.