Shrewsbury Climate Change Demonstration

Mon 25th March 5.30pm

The Guildhall, Frankwell Quay, Shrewsbury

Following on from successful motions passed by Oswestry Town Council and Shropshire Council, we invite everyone to a demonstration in support of a similar motion coming before Shrewsbury Town Council calling on it to declare a climate emergency and to take immediate steps to reduce carbon emissions.

The Clarion Choir will sing and there will be some short speeches from various groups.

The demonstration will begin outside the Guildhall at 5.30pm with as many people going into the meeting at 6.00pm as can fit.

In the news

• Shrewsbury town councillors declare climate emergency Shropshire Star, 27 Mar 2019
• Climate protestors march through Shrewsbury Shropshire Star, 20 Feb 2019
• Over 200 take part in march calling on councillors to declare a climate emergency Shropshire Live, 18 Feb 2019

Some pictures from the day

Images Copyright © 2018 Chris Davenport

The Motion

The full text of the motion, put forward by Labour Councillor Alan Mosley, is:

This Council notes that the IPCC’s Special Report on Global Warming of 1.5°C, published in October 2018, describes the enormous harm that a 2°C rise is likely to cause compared with a 1.5°C rise, and confirms that limiting Global Warming to 1.5°C may still be possible with ambitious action from national and sub-national authorities and others.

As well as increasing temperatures and more extreme weather, human activities are also having a massive impact on nature. The worldwide population of mammals, birds, fish and aquatic creatures, amphibians and reptiles have plunged by almost 60 percent, since 1970. Current rates of species extinction are 100- to 1,000-times higher than the ‘standard rate’ of extinction. There are also huge health impacts associated with fossil fuels, for example, air pollution causes 40,000 excess deaths every year in the UK and reduces average life span globally by 2 years.

To reduce the chance of runaway global warming and limit the effects of climate breakdown, it is imperative that, as a species, we reduce our CO2eq (carbon equivalent) emissions from their current 6.5 tonnes per person per year to less than 2 tonnes as soon as possible. Individuals cannot be expected to make this reduction on their own. Society needs to change its laws, taxation, infrastructure etc., to make low carbon living easier and the new norm. The good news is there are many social, environmental and economic benefits in doing so.

We welcome action by London, Bristol and other City Councils around the world to declare and commit resources to tackling a ‘Climate Emergency’. We also welcome actions by other Town and Borough Councils such as Scarborough, Frome and Stroud and more locally Machynlleth and Oswestry to pledge to be carbon neutral by 2030.

We therefore resolve that Shrewsbury Town Council:-

1. Supports the Declaration of a Climate Emergency
2. Pledges to make the Council carbon neutral by 2030
3. Calls on Westminster to provide powers and resources to make this possible
4. Signs up to the Covenant of Mayors
5. Requests that the Finance and General Purposes Committee develops a detailed Action Plan in pursuit of the above objectives and reports back within 6 months.