GREEN chiefs have welcomed the declaration of a climate emergency in the city after councillors backed a bid to make Worcester carbon neutral by 2030.
The Green Party bid, put forward by Coun Neil Laurenson, was passed with the support of Labour councillors at a meeting of the city council last Tuesday (July 16). A bid by the Conservatives to extend the deadline to 2050 was given the thumbs down.
Speaking at the meeting, Coun Laurenson said when he joined the Green Party in 2009, he did not imagine that a decade later councils across the country would be declaring a climate emergency.
“I did not think that things would be as bad as they are. The majority of climate scientists around the world believe that humanity is responsible for climate change – or, to be more accurate, climate breakdown.
“The 2030 target in the motion we are about to debate recognises the urgency of our situation as described by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
“As 16-year-old campaigner Greta Thunberg said in her speech at the United Nations climate conference in Poland last December: ‘We can’t solve a crisis without treating it as a crisis.’
The green light means Worcester City Council joins more than 100 councils across the country including nearby Stratford District Council who have declared a climate emergency.
“We can be proud of what we have achieved in Worcester: solar panels installed on St Martin’s Car Park; the development of wildflower meadows; agreement on another walking / cycling bridge; and, crucially, the recruitment of an Environmental Sustainability Officer,” Coun Laurenson said.
“Worcester has seen some fundamental and huge undertakings in the last 200 years. Canals, railways, clean water, sanitation, children going to school, electrification, telegrams, roads, gas, telephones, the internet.
“Each has cost a lot of money and required a lot of work and effort, but each time we have benefited enormously with more jobs, better health, more comfort and a better economy,” he added.
His calls won support from Labour Coun Pat Agar who said: “Logic dictates whether we believe in climate change or not, we can’t afford to be wrong because if climate change is really happening and we really are influencing it, we must act and act fast.”
Tory leader Coun Marc Bayliss called for the target date to be pushed back to 2050 and said: “We need a worldwide response to climate change because we on our own will never be able to tackle the challenges facing us from climate change.
But his calls were dismissed by Labour leader Coun Adrian Gregson who accused Coun Bayliss and the Conservatives of ‘kicking the can down the road’ by proposing a delay.
All Labour and Green councillors supported Coun Laurenson’s calls with seven Conservative votes against and nine abstentions.
