EARTH FIRST | Emergency motion defeated but debate about climate is warming up

In proposing this motion, Cr Nugent, supported by councillors Joanne McRae and Mario Previtera, have offered the council the opportunity to join with 600 jurisdictions in 13 countries who have declared a climate emergency.

So far a climate emergency has been declared by 74 million citizens in Canada, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Switzerland and Spain.

In Australia, where climate emergency declaration was launched in May, 2016, jurisdictions representing roughly two million people have declared a climate emergency.

Climate research and modelling would indicate that there is definitely a climate emergency and that we have a window of no more than 10 years to develop policies and actions to address it.

There has been a number of major reports recently published, such as that of the International Panel for Climate Change, which warned that urgent action is needed if we are to avoid its worst effects.

An emergency declaration is particularly relevant to the electorate of Calare, which has been identified by recent Australian National University research as being in the top five areas in Australia to be adversely affected by climate change.

The need for action, the evidence that action is required, the urgency for action and the expectation of leadership on this issue was eloquently expressed by five speakers for the motion who addressed the packed community forum prior to the debate, many of whom were wearing red to indicate their support for the motion.

Thanks to those speakers and councillors willing to show leadership - they give us hope.

Unfortunately, the motion was not supported by the rest of the council.

However, councillors Nugent, McRae and Previtera have initiated debate that has opened the door to further discussion, which hopefully will lead to action.

There is an opportunity to continue the discussion on climate change and our community's response to it through the next meeting of Futuring Orange, a group of residents who are concerned about climate change.

This meeting will be held on Wednesday, July 24 at the Parkview Hotel, commencing 5.30pm.