At the third time of asking I finally managed to get to see a screening of the film “People’s Emergency Briefing“. This is, for those that haven’t heard about it, a 50 minute film about climate change based on presentations given by “so-called” experts to select politicians held in Westminster last year.
Grass Roots Movement
The people behind the film are encouraging local groups to host screenings of the film to get it in front of as many people as possible. The screening I went to was held at a local pub and was attended by about 20 people along with probably about 10 councillors and other interested parties.
The councillors were 90% Lib Dems and one from the Greens. While this does reflect the make-up of our local council somewhat it was disappointing that nobody from Labour, the party in power and the party of our local MP, had bothered to attend. I obviously wasn’t expecting anyone from a shades of blue party to come.
The Film
The film is introduced by broadcaster and campaigner Chris Packham who brought the segments together and interviewed a range of people on their thoughts on what they had seen. These people included both members of the public and celebrities such as Jennifer Saunders, whose liberal use of the f-bomb must take sole responsibility for the films 16+ rating, and Deborah Meaden.
Now is the least extreme weather we will experience
The film was broken down into a number of sections as follows:
- Defence & National Security: Examining geopolitical stability, risks of resource scarcity, and threats to security.
- Food Systems: Looking at agricultural resilience, supply chain vulnerabilities, and food security.
- Health & Safety: Addressing public health impacts, extreme weather hazards, and community wellbeing.
- The Economy: Assessing financial risks, infrastructure resilience, and the economic imperative of a rapid transition.
- Nature & Biodiversity: Focusing on habitat loss, pollution, and the decline of natural ecosystems.
- Solutions & Action: Concluding with practical, evidence-based steps that communities, organisations, and governments can implement to build resilience.
We can build AI but we can’t treat our shit
The first sections were, quite frankly, pretty depressing with very gloomy outlooks for the future of our country and the whole planet. Not for me of course, but things don’t look too rosy for my children or grandchildren.
We don’t have the infrastructure in place to deal with the reality today let alone what could be the case in the future. The situation clearly needs action now and on a global scale too. Good job that we all get along so well and the planet has a history of working things out collectively…
It’s the losers that have the loudest voice
The film ends on a more positive note highlighting things such as the fact that the transition to green energy is 73% cheaper than we thought it would be five years ago. Solar, wind and EVs have been adopted at much faster rate than expected. Take China for example they already have 50% of their energy on renewables and 50% of their vehicles are EVs. This leadership position isn’t just a reaction to climate change it is also a business decision – they can sell their leadership in green technologies to the rest of the world.
The change required is also affordable – just 0.2% of GDP, £4 billion, a year to sort. So we can afford net zero despite what others say. The issue is, as pointed out by Deborah Meaden, those that stand to lose the most, oil and gas companies etc. have the loudest voices. They also have deep pockets to “lobby” their position.
The issues as I seem them as firstly that the political agenda is looking elsewhere: cost of living, health service, small boats etc. and secondly we as a country put profit and shareholders before anything else – Thames Water is an excellent example.
Post film
After the film there was a question and answer session discussing what we had seen in the film, how it made us feel, and what the council were doing in response. The slight issue with this was that there were five councillors all wanting to speak which made it slightly elongated.
There are three groups of people need to see this film:
- Those already brought in
- Those that are too busy
- The deniers
The issue I had was that given the high number of electric cars in car park I suspect that the film might have been preaching to the first group of people in this case. Change will only come if groups two and three are engaged and watch the film. To this end there is a campaign to get the film shown on all the major TV channels so that it is seen by a wider audience. I have written to my MP to encourage her to support this but I know that climate change is a political topic and it really shouldn’t be.
Right, I’m off to buy a heat pump!
