Climate Action Now! Australian Socialists Adopt Climate Charter

July 20, 2010

“Change the system, not the climate: A safe climate is not possible unless an informed and mobilised community fights for it.”

2010 Climate Charter adopted by Australia’s Socialist Alliance and supported by SA candidates in the country’s current General Election.

For years, climate scientists have warned us that we need to act on climate change. Now, science is saying that climate change is taking place more rapidly than everyone previously thought.

The warning signs are obvious. April and May were the world’s hottest months since records began. This year’s Arctic ice sheet melt is taking place at a pace never seen before.

Scientists say carbon pollution has made the world’s oceans more acidic than they have been for at least 20 million years.

There is already too much carbon in the atmosphere. The warming already in the system risks the crossing of various natural “tipping points” that would raise temperatures further and faster.

If these points are crossed, it would bring average temperatures to levels that have not existed for millions of years, and to which today’s nature is simply not adapted.

In a warmer world, most existing species would die out. Large-scale agriculture would be difficult or impossible.

Invitation to the Peoples’ World Conference on Climate Change and Mother Earth’s Rights

April 20-22, 2010 – Cochabamba, Bolivia

Considering that climate change represents a real threat to the existence of humanity, of living beings and our Mother Earth as we know it today;

Noting the serious danger that exists to islands, coastal areas, glaciers in the Himalayas, the Andes and mountains of the world, poles of the Earth, warm regions like Africa, water sources, populations affected by increasing natural disasters, plants and animals, and ecosystems in general;

Making clear that those most affected by climate change will be the poorest in the world who will see their homes and their sources of survival destroyed, and who will be forced to migrate and seek refuge;Confirming that 75% of historical emissions of greenhouse gases originated in the countries of the North that followed a path of irrational industrialization;

Noting that climate change is a product of the capitalist system;

Regretting the failure of the Copenhagen Conference caused by countries called “developed”, that fail to recognize the climate debt they have with developing countries, future generations and Mother Earth;

Affirming that in order to ensure the full fulfillment of human rights in the twenty-first century, it is necessary to recognize and respect Mother Earth’s rights;

Reaffirming the need to fight for climate justice;

Recognizing the need to take urgent actions to avoid further damage and suffering to humanity, Mother Earth and to restore harmony with nature;

Confident that the peoples of the world, guided by the principles of solidarity, justice and respect for life, will be able to save humanity and Mother Earth, and Celebrating the International Day of Mother Earth,

The Government of the Plurinational State of Bolivia calls on the peoples of the world, social movements and Mother Earth’s defenders, and invites scientists, academics, lawyers and governments that want to work with their citizens to the Peoples’ World Conference on Climate Change and Mother Earth’s Rights to be held from 20th to 22nd April 2010 in Cochabamba, Bolivia.

The Peoples’ World Conference on Climate Change and Mother Earth’s Rights has as objectives:

(1) To analyze the structural and systemic causes that drive climate change and to propose radical measures to ensure the well-being of all humanity in harmony with nature

(2) To discuss and agree on the project of a Universal Declaration of Mother Earth Rights

(3) To agree on proposals for new commitments to the Kyoto Protocol and projects for a COP Decision under the United Nations Framework for Climate Change that will guide future actions in those countries that are engaged with life during climate change negotiations and in all United Nations scenarios, related to:

• Climate debt
• Climate change migrants-refugees
• Emission reductions
• Adaptation
• Technology transfer
• Finance
• Forest and Climate Change
• Shared Vision
• Indigenous Peoples,
• and Others

(4) To work on the organization of the Peoples’ World Referendum on Climate Change

(5) To analyze and develop an action plan to advance the establishment of a Climate Justice Tribunal

(6) To define strategies for action and mobilization to defend life from Climate Change and to defend Mother Earth’s Rights.

Evo Morales Ayma
President of the Plurinational State of Bolivia
Bolivia, January 5th, 2010

Blogging for a Fare-Free New Zealand

New Zealand has a new blogsite promoting free and frequent public transport, it's called Fare-Free New Zealand. Go to http://farefreenz.blogspot.com/

The editors welcome any NZ or international stories related to the campaign for fare-free public transport. Send to farefreenz(at)clear.net.nz 

The call for free public transport is being made internationally by environmentalists, campaigners against climate change, Green parties, and eco-socialists. It's a campaign focus that makes lots of ecological, economic and political sense. And it's a grassroots response to the threat of climate change that challenges the pro-market illogic of the pollution market (otherwise known as carbon or emissions trading).

Free and frequent public transport is one of the Ten Commandments promoted by RAM-Residents Action Movements. To read more about RAM's thinking on ecology and combating climate change read The RAM Plan.

Climate justice movement to converge on UN climate talks

from Without Your Walls The following statement was produced at the Climate Justice Action (CJA) meeting in Copenhagen 19-21 June. CJA is calling on all peoples around the planet to mobilize and take action against the root causes of climate change and the key agents responsible, both in Copenhagen and around the world.

Change the system, not the climate! Climate justice movement to converge on UN climate talks The UN climate talks will not solve the climate crisis. We are no closer to reducing greenhouse gas emissions than we were when international negotiations began fifteen years ago: emissions are rising faster than ever, while carbon trading allows climate criminals to pollute and profit. At present, the talks are essentially legitimising a new colonialism that carves up of the world’s remaining resources. Faced with the profound crisis of our civilisation, and the destructive impacts of the climate crisis on already marginalised communities, all we get is a political circus playing to the interests of corporations. In response to this madness, a global movement for climate justice has emerged to reclaim power over our future. As part of this, the international network Climate Justice Action is mobilising for mass actions across the world during the international climate negotiations in Copenhagen in December 2009. No more false solutions We cannot trust the market with our future, nor put our faith in unsafe, unproven and unsustainable technologies. Contrary to those who put their faith in “green capitalism”, we know that it is impossible to have infinite growth on a finite planet. Instead of trying to fix a destructive system, we should be:

• leaving fossil fuels in the ground
• reasserting peoples’ and community control over resources and production
• relocalising food production
• massively reducing overconsumption, particularly in the North
• recognising the ecological and climate debt owed to the peoples of the South and making reparations
• respecting indigenous and forest peoples’ rights

Real solutions to the climate crisis are being built by women and men, in both the South and the North, who fight every day to defend their environment and living conditions. We need to globalise these solutions and work for a just transition towards a zero-carbon future. Agreed at the Climate Justice Action meeting Copenhagen, 21 June 2009.

See Oxfam's recent dire report on the impact of Climate Change on the world's poorest

Global warming: NZ can and must act

by Auckland union activist 8 April 2009 A huge ice shelf in Antarctica is collapsing. See NZ rearranges deckchairs while ice shelf collapses This is more dramatic evidence that global warming is a reality. Yet still the right wing, who in the past denied that global warming was real and therefore we should do nothing, are still saying that we should still do nothing, because New Zealand's CO2 emissions are so small (less than 0.01% of world’s total) that curbing them will make no discernable difference and would just hurt business interests. But New Zealand can make a difference. When New Zealand declared itself Nuclear Weapons Free in 1987 the nuclear powers, in particular, the US, were so concerned that New Zealand's example could spread that they pressured and bullied Prime Minister Lange to make a globally circulated public statement that "this policy was not for export." Of course, people all over the world were inspired by NZ’s stance. And following our lead this policy was taken up within other Pacifica countries. The Fiji Anti Nuclear Group (FANG) in alliance with the powerful Fijian union movement was very influential, and influenced the anti-nuclear policy of the briefly elected Fiji Labour Party, before it was deposed by the US supported military coup in 1987. What NZ does is important. If we took serious steps to halt greenhouse gas emissions here, we could announce boldly that "this policy is for export". I’m sure we would be supported by our Pacifica neighbours and friends, who are already being directly affected by global warming. We can make a difference. A Climate Camp is being held at Parihaka 24-26 April. Participants will be discussing how to build a people's movement against climate change. Visit http://www.climatecamp.org.nz/HOME.html for more information. And for some background reading on NZ's nuclear-free policy read The Kiwi that Roared: Nuclear-Free New Zealand in a Nuclear-Armed World by Wade Huntley, an American academic.

Monbiot: We cannot afford to surrender

by George Monbiot 17 March 2009 from The Guardian It will be difficult and expensive to keep climate change to a minimum, but the alternative is unthinkable.Quietly in public, loudly in private, climate scientists everywhere are saying the same thing: it’s over. The years in which more than two degrees of global warming could have been prevented have passed, the opportunities squandered by denial and delay. On current trajectories we’ll be lucky to get away with four degrees. Mitigation (limiting greenhouse gas pollution) has failed; now we must adapt to what nature sends our way. If we can.

Continue

See also:

• Scientists Issue Six Blunt Warnings on Climate Change
• Hansen: Protests and direct action needed to stop emissions
• Aussie Socialists Adopt 10 Point Action Plan to Stop Climate Change
• The Belem Ecosocialist Declaration
• Ten lessons for the climate movement: looking back, moving forward
• 350 - new international initiative calls for global action to stop climate change

Ten lessons for the climate movement

A mass global movement that sweeps aside corporate opposition and drives through a raft of public solutions to prevent runaway climate change is urgent needed. Without such a movement the future for Australia and every other country on the planet looks bleak.

Aussie activist Damien Lawson puts forward his ten lessons for the climate movement. To read the full article click here 1. Changing government does not mean a change in policy 2. Continuous mobilisation 3. If we are not frightened then no-one else will be 4. Knocking on doors is as important as climbing smoke-stacks 5. Alliance building is more than box-ticking 6. Propose solutions that will work 7. Stop talking about the reef and start talking about people 8. But is it the economy, stupid? 9. We are activists not policy advisers 10. Our movement is and must be global Damien Lawson is the coordinator of the Climate Action Centre, Melbourne and works for Friends of the Earth Australia. His article first appeared in a Climate Reader prepared by the Carbon Equity project for Australia's Climate Action Summit. Visit http://www.carbonequity.info See also:

• NZ socialists sign-up to Belem Ecosocialist Declaration
• Aussie Socialists Adopt 10 Point Action Plan to Stop Climate Change

Aussie Socialists Adopt 10 Point Action Plan to Stop Climate Change

Our Common Cause: Climate Change − the Danger is Now from Green Left Weekly 24 January 2009 The fate of advanced human civilisation − and perhaps of our species itself − hangs in the balance. Fuelled by human-induced greenhouse gas emissions, global warming is advancing at a pace inconceivable to scientists just a few years ago. The complete melting in late summers of Arctic sea ice − something that scientists used to predict for the final decades of this century − is now widely expected by 2013-15. As the highly reflective ice is replaced by dark water, much more of the sun’s heat is captured. Mean Arctic temperatures in recent years have been as much as 3°C above their long-term averages.

Continue

Monbiot: We cannot afford to surrender

by George Monbiot 17 March 2009 from The Guardian It will be difficult and expensive to keep climate change to a minimum, but the alternative is unthinkable. Quietly in public, loudly in private, climate scientists everywhere are saying the same thing: it’s over. The years in which more than two degrees of global warming could have been prevented have passed, the opportunities squandered by denial and delay. On current trajectories we’ll be lucky to get away with four degrees. Mitigation (limiting greenhouse gas pollution) has failed; now we must adapt to what nature sends our way. If we can. This, at any rate, was the repeated whisper at the climate change conference in Copenhagen last week(1). It’s more or less what Bob Watson, the environment department’s chief scientific adviser, has been telling the British government(2). It is the obvious if unspoken conclusion of scores of scientific papers. Recent work by scientists at the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, for example, suggests that even global cuts of 3% a year, starting in 2020, could leave us with four degrees of warming by the end of the century(3,4). At the moment emissions are heading in the opposite direction at roughly the same rate. If this continues, what does it mean? Six? Eight? Ten degrees? Who knows? Faced with such figures, I can’t blame anyone for throwing up his hands. But before you succumb to this fatalism, let me talk you through the options. Yes, it is true that mitigation has so far failed. Sabotaged by Clinton(5), abandoned by Bush, attended half-heartedly by the other rich nations, the global climate talks have so far been a total failure. The targets they have set bear no relationship to the science and are negated anyway by loopholes and false accounting. Nations like the UK which are meeting their obligations under the Kyoto protocol have succeeded only by outsourcing their pollution to other countries(6,7). Nations like Canada, which are flouting their obligations, face no meaningful sanctions. Lord Stern made it too easy: he appears to have underestimated the costs of mitigation. As the professor of energy policy Dieter Helm has shown, Stern’s assumption that our consumption can continue to grow while our emissions fall is implausible(8). To have any hope of making substantial cuts we have both to reduce our consumption and transfer resources to countries like China to pay for the switch to low-carbon technologies. As Helm notes, “there is not much in the study of human nature—and indeed human biology—to give support to the optimist.” But we cannot abandon mitigation unless we have a better option. We don’t. If you think our attempts to prevent emissions are futile, take a look at our efforts to adapt. Where Stern appears to be correct is in proposing that the costs of stopping climate breakdown - great as they would be - are far lower than the costs of living with it. Germany is spending E600m just on a new sea wall for Hamburg(9) - and this money was committed before the news came through that sea level rises this century could be two or three times as great as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has predicted(10). The Netherlands will spend E2.2bn on dykes between now and 2015; again they are likely to be inadequate. The UN suggests that the rich countries should be transferring $50-75bn a year to the poor ones now to help them cope with climate change, with a massive increase later on(11). But nothing like this is happening. A Guardian investigation reveals that the rich nations have promised $18bn to help the poor nations adapt to climate change over the past seven years, but they have disbursed only 5% of that money(12). Much of it has been transferred from foreign aid budgets anyway: a net gain for the poor of nothing(13). Oxfam has made a compelling case for how adaptation should be funded: nations should pay according to the amount of carbon they produce per capita, coupled with their position on the human development index(14). On this basis, the US should supply over 40% of the money and the European Union over 30%, with Japan, Canada, Australia and Korea making up the balance. But what are the chances of getting them to cough up? There’s a limit to what this money could buy anyway. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change says that “global mean temperature changes greater than 4°C above 1990-2000 levels” would “exceed … the adaptive capacity of many systems.”(15) At this point there’s nothing you can do, for example, to prevent the loss of ecosystems, the melting of glaciers and the disintegration of major ice sheets. Elsewhere it spells out the consequences more starkly: global food production, it says, is “very likely to decrease above about 3°C”(16). Buy your way out of that. And it doesn’t stop there. The IPCC also finds that, above three degrees of warming, the world’s vegetation will become “a net source of carbon”(17). This is just one of the climate feedbacks triggered by a high level of warming. Four degrees might take us inexorably to five or six: the end - for humans - of just about everything. Until recently, scientists spoke of carbon concentrations - and temperatures - peaking and then falling back. But a recent paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences shows that “climate change … is largely irreversible for 1,000 years after emissions stop.”(18) Even if we were to cut carbon emissions to zero today, by the year 3000 our contribution to atmospheric concentrations would decline by just 40%. High temperatures would remain more or less constant until then. If we produce it we’re stuck with it. In the rich nations we will muddle through, for a few generations, and spend nearly everything we have on coping. But where the money is needed most there will be nothing. The ecological debt the rich world owes to the poor will never be discharged, just as it has never accepted that it should offer reparations for the slave trade and for the pillage of gold, silver, rubber, sugar and all the other commodities taken without due payment from its colonies. Finding the political will for crash cuts in carbon production is improbable. But finding the political will - when the disasters have already begun - to spend adaptation money on poor nations rather than on ourselves will be impossible. The world won’t adapt and can’t adapt: the only adaptive response to a global shortage of food is starvation. Of the two strategies it is mitigation, not adaptation, which turns out to be the most feasible option, even if this stretches the concept of feasibility to the limits. As Dieter Helm points out, the action required today is unlikely but “not impossible. It is a matter ultimately of human well being and ethics.”(19) Yes, it might already be too late - even if we reduced emissions to zero tomorrow - to prevent more than two degrees of warming, but we cannot behave as if it is, for in doing so we make the prediction come true. Tough as this fight may be, improbable as success might seem, we cannot afford to surrender. References: 1. Eg David Adam, 13th March 2009. Stern attacks politicians over climate ‘devastation’. The Guardian. 2. James Randerson, 7th August 2008. Climate change: Prepare for global temperature rise of 4C, warns top scientist. The Guardian. 3. Kevin Anderson and Alice Bows, 2008. Reframing the climate change challenge in light of post-2000 emission trends. Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A. Published online. doi:10.1098/rsta.2008.0138http://www.tyndall.ac.uk/publications/journal_papers/fulltext.pdf 4. They are referring to stabilisation at 650 parts per million CO2 equivalent. The IPCC suggests that this would produce something the region of 4C, even before all the likely feedbacks have b een taken into account. See Table SPM6 of the IPCC’s Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report - Summary for Policymakers. http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/syr/ar4_syr_spm.pdf 5. http://www.monbiot.com/archives/2007/12/17/hurray-were-going-backwards/ 6. http://www.sei.se/index.php?page=newsitem&item=5720 7. http://www.dieterhelm.co.uk/publications/Carbon_record_2007.pdf 8. Dieter Helm, 21st February 2009. Environmental challenges in a warming world: consumption, costs and responsibilities. Tanner Lecture, Oxford.http://www.dieterhelm.co.uk/publications/TANNER%20LECTURE%20Feb09.pdf 9. Oxfam, 29th May 2007. Adapting to climate change. Briefing Paper 104. http://www.oxfam.org.uk/resources/policy/climate_change/downloads/bp104_adapting_to_climate_change.pdf 10. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/mar/11/sea-level-rises-climate-change-copenhagen 11. John Vidal, 20th February 2009. Rich nations failing to meet climate aid pledges. The Guardian. 12. ibid. 13. Oxfam, 29th May 2007, ibid. 14. Oxfam, 29th May 2007, ibid. 15. IPCC, 2007b. Assessing key vulnerabilities and the risk from climate change. http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar4/wg2/ar4-wg2-chapter19.pdf 16. ibid, Table 19.1. 17. IPCC, 2007b, ibid. 18. Susan Solomona,1, Gian-Kasper Plattnerb, Reto Knuttic, and Pierre Friedlingstein, 16th December 2008. Irreversible climate change due to carbon dioxide emissions. http://www.pnas.org/content/early/2009/01/28/0812721106.full.pdf+html 19. Dieter Helm, 21st February 2009, ibid.

Ten lessons for the climate movement: looking back, moving forward

by Damien Lawson from Green Left Weekly 25 February 2009 “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you then they fight you, then you win.” - Mahatma Gandhi More climate groups, better coordination of grassroots actions, increasing public concern, and even the election of the Rudd government are significant markers. However, that progress is yet to translate into a meaningful shift in policy, let alone spark the transformation of society in Australia and globally that is needed to prevent catastrophe and ensure a return to a safe climate. 1. Changing government does not mean a change in policy The honeymoon of the Rudd government on climate is over; divorce is in the air. Many people are outraged with the outcome of 5% carbon emissions reduction by 2020 (4% on 1990 Kyoto levels) and the polluter-friendly trading scheme. But did we really think that the level and depth of mobilisation we have seen to date would lead to the type of transformation that is needed? Even the scale of the Whitlam Labor government reforms, which represent the most substantial changes made by a peacetime Australian government, are minor compared to the transformational changes that are needed to halt climate change. So we will need a public mobilisation that dwarfs any that Australia or the world has seen. This means far more than a change in government. Yet the strategy of most environment NGOs in 2006-08 seemed to be one of mobilising the community to elect a Labor government, and then talking softly to the new government behind closed doors, rather than continue the mobilisation. As we learned in 2008, lobbying is meaningless unless the one lobbied believes there will be real political consequence from them failing to act. 2. Continuous mobilisation So our aim must be the continuous mobilisation of the community. Not turning people on and off like a tap when an issue or election comes up. This means a far greater depth of education, community involvement and coordination. For example, why was The Big Switch website, which sought to link individuals in the community with their local MPs, put in the freezer after the election? Arguably this type of resource is needed more now than ever. We must also see our efforts to mobilise the community as a long-term project of getting every organisation in a particular locality to recognise the full implications of climate change and to put the heat on local MPs until they become advocates for the movement, not barriers to action. We need to create movement resources that can do this; the Melbourne Climate Action Centre is one such modest attempt. 3. If we are not frightened then no-one else will be For a long time, there has been a debate in the environment and now the climate movement about “fear versus hope”. Some say talking too much about the problem will depress people or cause them to switch off. We need to advocate “positive solutions” as the common catch-cry. But this false dichotomy is often a mask for conservative positions that seek to maintain a delusional strategy on climate change, which sees advocacy of small, immediately “achievable” steps as the only approach that will work. However, the desire to propose small steps that can be easily adopted by government not only leads to advocacy of solutions that won’t solve the climate problem, but often also prevents the truth about the real extent of the climate problem being told. As US activist Ken Ward points out, there is an odd disconnect between our raising of the alarm and then advocacy of tiny steps that can lead to a disbelief on the part of those who receive our message. It is reasonable to be terrified knowing where the planet is heading. But the truth is, unless we behave like terrified people then why should anyone else? And unless people are terrified they will not support the scale of action that is needed to solve the problem. As Oscar Wilde said: “The basis of optimism is sheer terror.” 4. Knocking on doors is as important as climbing smoke-stacks The grassroots movement has contributed to public understanding of the urgency of the climate problem by civil-disobedience actions that create media attention and flag the seriousness with which some citizens take the issue. However, there is a danger that a one-sided emphasis on such actions can substitute for the less glamorous work of engaging the community. We need to find ways to take the urgency of climate change direct to people in their communities through door knocking, local events and other direct communications. Imagine a national doorknock day where grassroots activists fan out across the suburbs bringing a single message of the need for urgent action. Imagine a day where we all protest on sports ovals that will be destroyed by climate change or mark the sea-level rises on our foreshores and in our community. However, climbing smokestacks is still important too. We need more civil disobedience not less. The task is to focus on actions that can mobilise large numbers in civil disobedience actions, rather than small heroic groups. Small actions can be part of, but cannot substitute for, wider mobilisation. Only when we have thousands gathered to sit-in at power stations will such actions move from the symbolic and become truly powerful. 5. Alliance building is more than box-ticking It’s easy to “build alliances” by having some talking heads sign a joint statement at the end of a one-day seminar. But if it goes no further, this is not alliance building, it’s just box ticking. If all it does, for example, is give a green stamp of approval to “clean coal” proponents or welfare groups who oppose feed-in tariffs, it’s worse than doing nothing. The important action is not the signature and the media release, it’s about the allies - whether they be welfare groups, unions, churches, farmers or business groups - taking committed action to educate, resource and mobilise their member organisations and their individual members in support of the propositions and commitments signed on to. Alliance building is about being able to mobilise real political forces across diverse sectors, and if that isn’t the power that has been gained by building alliances, then in the long run they are not worth the paper they are written on. 6. Propose solutions that will work Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s 5% policy should make clear the bankruptcy of the strategy, as one environment NGO leader described their own climate campaign decision-making, of taking the science and putting it through a “political filter”. The targets and proposals we propose as a movement will be used by politicians to judge how much and how little they must do, and by the public to assess the actions of politicians. If we continue to advocate policies just beyond what the government wants to do (the approach adopted by most of the big climate NGOs), then we will get less than that and have misled the public as well. Surely the only credible and viable approach is to patiently build support for a solution that can fully solve the problem. This means educating the politicians and public about why such a solution is necessary. Initially, the actions of politicians will fall short of our goals, but then they must face the judgement of an educated public armed with the truth, not the “truth” put through a “political filter”. When leading scientists are talking about the safe zone being 280 to 325 parts per million of atmospheric CO2 and the need for zero emissions, why can’t the leading climate NGOs get on board and put the science first? 7. Stop talking about the reef and start talking about people The latest campaign by the Australian Conservation Foundation about Australia’s iconic places is an example of the communications failure of the movement. As long as we talk only about the Great Barrier Reef and Kakadu, we will continue to reinforce a perception of climate change as a threat only to the environment and not the whole of society and civilisation. We also send message that it can be managed like other environmental problems. To make progress, climate needs to be understood NOT as an “environment sector” issue, but as a whole-of-society problem that is as much about human rights as anything else. Fundamentally, we need to talk more about the impact on people, not beautiful places. The emphasis on Australian impacts by many of the environment NGOs also reinforces this problem. Because it means, for example, the more than one billion people facing the loss of the Himalayan glacial melt water are not part of the debate. The idea that Australians only care about Australian places in the context of a globalised cosmopolitan society is narrow in the extreme. 8. But is it the economy, stupid? The movement was taken down a rabbit hole partly of its own making after the election when we allowed the debate to be about the “economic cost” of climate change. As long as the terrain of debate remains on costs, we will lose because, while it is technically possible to show how the “cost of inaction” is greater than the “cost of action”, politically and emotionally it reinforces a fear of economic down-turn, loss of jobs and cost to the public. The bankers and corporations will always win such a debate, as we have seen. The planet cannot be reduced to the economy. Instead we should show clearly that the scale of the disaster means we must act regardless of the cost. The emergency message and the war-time analogy are crucial in this debate. 9. We are activists not policy advisers There is a danger in all movements of being so close to an issue that we start to believe that all we need to do is create and describe a perfect solution and our job is done. In reality, however, policy outcomes are never about the elegance of a solution, but about power. As long as we continue to focus on emission wedges and the technicalities about how to get to zero, we will keep losing. Our job is to convince the public that the government must fix the problem, not come up with the perfect solution. This has been the usefulness of the message about “climate emergency” because it encapsulates in one phrase the scale of the problem and the scale of the solution that is needed. 10. Our movement is and must be global The argument of the Howard and Rudd governments - that China and India must act and that climate change is a global problem - has often been strongly opposed by the climate movement and for good reason. This argument is used as an excuse for inaction by Australia. However, we should not let such a debate prevent us from seeing the truth in elements of Rudd’s argument. We cannot solve the problem in Australia and we do need global action and cooperation. For us, this means creating more global links and cooperation amongst grassroots movements and continuing to leverage off each other’s actions. We must look for opportunities in 2009 to work with groups and networks locally and internationally that have as the goal of mobilising of the global community around science-based demands. [Damien Lawson is coordinator of the Climate Action Centre, Melbourne and works for Friends of the Earth Australia. The article first appeared in a Climate Reader prepared by the Carbon Equity project for Australia's Climate Action Summit. Visit http://www.carbonequity.info]

Aussie Socialists Adopt 10 Point Action Plan to Stop Climate Change

Our Common Cause: Climate Change − the Danger is Now from Green Left Weekly 24 January 2009 The fate of advanced human civilisation − and perhaps of our species itself − hangs in the balance. Fuelled by human-induced greenhouse gas emissions, global warming is advancing at a pace inconceivable to scientists just a few years ago. The complete melting in late summers of Arctic sea ice − something that scientists used to predict for the final decades of this century − is now widely expected by 2013-15. As the highly reflective ice is replaced by dark water, much more of the sun’s heat is captured. Mean Arctic temperatures in recent years have been as much as 3°C above their long-term averages. A band of increased warmth 1500km wide stretches south from the Arctic Ocean to cover the main regions of Arctic permafrost. The permafrost is now melting. As it does so, ever-growing volumes of methane gas are bubbling from lakes and swamps. Given off when plant matter decays in an oxygen-poor environment, methane has a potent greenhouse effect. Though relatively short-lived in the atmosphere the gas, while present, traps heat at around 72 times the rate of carbon dioxide. Global warming threatens to become self-accelerating as natural “tipping points” are passed, triggering “positive feedbacks” that pour additional carbon from soils and forests into the atmosphere. After the sea ice, the next tipping point may lie in the forests of the Amazon. Heating up, drying out and burning, its trees and peatlands threaten to let loose a fresh flood of greenhouse gases. Scientific advances in the last few years have sharply changed the way researchers perceive the climate danger. Earlier computer models of the Earth’s climate suggested that if rises in average global temperature could be kept below 2°C above pre-industrial levels, compared to today’s figure of 0.8°C, the worst effects of global warming could be avoided. But new studies warn that there is no level of additional greenhouse gases that we can “safely” release into the atmosphere. Even present levels of warming are highly dangerous, as the swift decline of Arctic sea ice shows. Moreover, additional warming of at least 0.5°C, the result of greenhouse gases already emitted, is built into the climate system. To have any hope of avoiding disaster, human society must allot truly massive resources, immediately, to the task of cutting atmospheric greenhouse gases to a point no more than marginally above pre-industrial levels. The Socialist Alliance acknowledged at its sixth national conference in December that from its present level of just under 390 parts per million (ppm), atmospheric carbon dioxide needs to fall to 300-325ppm. Targets for future emissions must be set at zero, or even negative. And the time-frame? As soon as humanly possible. Our new position reads: “Current science indicates that annual emissions reductions of at least 5% will be essential. We propose immediate economy-wide and sector-by-sector planning for all greenhouse gases, to meet these targets on time or before. We must establish mechanisms to review and change these targets as scientific forecasts are updated.” It is true that life on Earth has thrived during long geological ages when temperatures were far above those of the present. But the plants and animals then were very different from today’s species, which evolved over millions of years to live on a relatively cool planet. However, the rate at which global temperatures are now rising appears to be without precedent in the geological record. Could human beings flourish in the radically impoverished, highly unstable biosphere that business-as-usual emissions are likely to create? Small groups probably would, in a few favoured locations. But civilisation as we know it could not survive. In the boardrooms of huge capitalist corporations, the emerging picture has executives terrified for their profits. Giant polluters like Rio Tinto plead to be exempt from climate change legislation. Big-business media organs conceal the new science, belittle the scientists, and give top billing to ignorant claptrap from denialists and climate sceptics. And in the government offices, politicians loyal to the corporations frame emissions reduction targets which − like Rudd Labor’s 5-15% by 2020 − amount to suicide notes for most of nature and humanity. These miserable targets and Rudd’s carbon emissions trading system simply cannot produce the reductions required within 10 years. Yet the resources needed to avoid climate catastrophe exist − our enormous challenge is to organise a climate action movement strong enough to enforce implementation of a plan for climate sustainability. Without a plan the movement will be without perspective; without a powerful movement conscious of what it is fighting for, the best climate sustainability plan will never be realised. This is the understanding with which the Socialist Alliance has produced the second edition of its Climate Change Charter. It will soon be available online and in print. It outlines the peril we face, and how ordinary concerned people can force history onto the path of climate sustainability. It’s time to stop looking to official Australia for any serious response to global warming. The only force capable of bringing real change to government policy is the climate change movement itself, organising, protesting, spreading awareness of the drastic seriousness of the crisis and collaborating across the planet. For the scale and speed of the changes now needed, the best example history offers is the conversion of major economies to wartime production during World War II. The Socialist Alliance will be doing all it can to help strengthen the movement to make that possible. We offer the following 10-point plan as the minimum needed to meet the greatest challenge humanity has ever faced. Ten-point climate action plan Bringing greenhouse gas emissions under control will require deep changes and immense effort at every level; international, national and local. The Socialist Alliance says: 1. Implement immediate emission reduction targets with the aim of reducing net emissions to zero as soon as practicable, with a goal of achieving 100% of power from renewable sources by 2020. Introduce annual reduction targets of at least 5% to ensure that these targets are met. 2. Initiate further international treaty negotiations aimed at getting all countries to agree to these targets. Prioritise cutting rich industrial nations’ emissions, and supply aid to poorer countries to assist them in harnessing renewable sources of energy for industrial development. 3. Start the transition to a zero-waste economy. End industrial energy waste by legislation. Improve or ban wasteful consumer products. Engage workers in industry, with the appropriate technical experts, to redesign products and jobs sustainably. 4. Require the fitting of all feasible energy efficiency measures to existing houses and subsidise owner-occupiers for the costs. Allow renters to use the same system. Install photovoltaic solar panels and solar hot water heaters on home roofs, subsidised or owned by the electricity authority. Give commercial buildings a deadline to meet six-star energy standards within two years, and 10-star standards within 10 years. 5. Bring all power industries under public ownership and democratic control. Begin phasing out coalmining and coal-fired power immediately. Provide guaranteed jobs and retraining on full pay for coal mining and power-station communities, with new sustainable industries being built in their areas and paid redundancies offered. Run the maximum possible base-load power from existing natural gas and/or hydro power stations instead of coal only as an interim measure until renewable energy is available. Coal to be used only for predicted energy peaks in the short term. 6. Bring the whole car industry under public control. Re-tool this industry to manufacture wind turbines, public transport vehicles and infrastructure, solar hot water, solar photovoltaic cells. Subsidise the conversion of private cars to electric power. 7. Accelerate the construction of wind farms in suitable areas. Boost research into all renewable energy sources. Build pilot solar-thermal and geothermal plants now. Create localised power grids. 8. Stop logging old-growth forests and begin an urgent program of reforestation, carbon farming and protection of biodiversity to provide increased carbon sinks. 9. Phase out industrial farming based on fertilisers, pesticides and fuel sourced from petroleum. Work with farmers and their organisations to make food production sustainable and carbon negative. Restrict farming areas to ensure that riverine, forest and other indigenous ecosystems return to healthy states. Encourage new farming practices including organic and urban farming. This process must allow for security of food supplies, and guarantee full employment and retraining for rural communities. 10. Make all urban and regional public transport free and upgrade services to enable all urban residents to use it for regular commuting. Nationalise and upgrade interstate train and ferry services to provide real alternatives to air travel. Prioritise rail freight. All rail, light rail and interstate freight to be electrified or to run on biofuels from waste where possible. Encourage bicycle use through more cycleways, and better facilities for cyclists. Implement free or very cheap bicycle rental networks.