We need to build a firewall between politicians and the oil and gas firms driving the climate crisis.
Richard Burgon is the Labour MP for Leeds East
The same oil and gas giants behind the record energy bills that have forced so many into poverty have also brought us to the cliff edge of climate catastrophe.
If we are to have a fighting chance of preventing the worst of the climate crisis, then we need to rapidly cut fossil fuel use. Key to that is breaking the vast power that oil and gas companies have over our politics.
That’s why this week I will present a Bill in the House of Commons to ban MPs from receiving funding or any other benefit from oil and gas companies.
My Private Members Bill would stop MPs from taking any second jobs with, or receiving any donations, gifts, hospitality or benefits-in-kind from, any company that makes more than 50% of its annual revenue from oil or gas.
It would also force the Government to end investments by the Parliamentary Contributory Pension Fund in any oil and gas companies.
The aim of my Bill is simple: to build a firewall between our political decision-makers and the oil and gas corporations that have knowingly caused the climate crisis.
For decades, oil and gas giants used their vast financial power to confuse and undermine the science about the role of fossil fuels in driving climate change. More recently, their focus has moved on throwing huge sums at delaying, blocking and weakening global climate action.
Fossil fuel money also pollutes British politics. The Tory Party received £3.5m from donors with fossil fuel, polluter and climate denial links in 2022 according to an analysis of Electoral Commission records by DeSmog, an investigative website focused on global warming misinformation campaigns.
dizzy: Despite this article having been written by a Labour MP it should not be assumed that the UK Labour Party will be any different from the Conservatives on the climate crisis or fossil fuel industry.
ENVIRONMENTAL campaign group Greenpeace has warned that its future is under financial threat because of legal action by oil giant Shell.
It says its work in Britain and internationally will be in jeopardy if it loses a court case in which the company is demanding $1 million (£803,000) in damages after activists occupied a drilling platform being towed in the Atlantic last year.
The occupation attracted international attention.
The case is due to go to trial in July.
Greenpeace says it is facing similar legal action by “Big Oil” companies in the United States and Italy and has launched an appeal for donations to help it fight in court.
Ian Duff, who heads Greenpeace’s “Stop Drilling, Start Paying” campaign, said: “Greenpeace is under attack globally like never before.
“Right now, our colleagues in Italy, the USA, and here in the UK are all targets of intimidation lawsuits from oil giants, strategically deployed with one aim: silence anyone brave enough to stand up to their planet-wrecking business.”
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“Let’s be clear — it’s not about the money,” he said. “Shell makes the $1 million it is suing us for every half an hour.
30+ young people, scientists and supporters occupy Science Museum’s new climate gallery in protest over its sponsorship by coal-producing conglomerate Adani
Group announce plan to remain over weekend ahead of the opening to school groups next week
Naturalist Chris Packham says sponsorship deal is “beyond greenwash – it’s grotesque” and attends to support the protesters
Science Museum criticised over ties to conglomerate involved in manufacturing drones for the Israeli military amidst bombardment of Gaza and destructive coal mining operations in India and Australia opposed by Indigenous groups
This evening, more than 30 protesters led by young people from Youth Action for Climate Justice and members of Scientists for Extinction Rebellion have occupied the Science Museum’s new climate gallery, Energy Revolution, over its sponsorship by the coal giant and arms manufacturer, Adani. Naturalist and broadcaster Chris Packham joined the group as they began their protest, with scientists and young people now intending to remain in the museum over the weekend, with the first school visits to the gallery beginning on Monday.
Chris Packham, who famously claimed that peacefully breaking the law is the ethically responsible thing to do when it comes to protecting the planet, told the protesters: “For me science is the art of understanding truth and beauty and a lot of that beauty lies in the natural world. Science tells us that the fossil fuel industry is responsible for the accelerating destruction of our natural world. The Science Museum is a place to spark imagination, to provide answers but also to encourage us to ask questions. The question I’m asking today is a big one, “why on earth are we allowing a destructive industry to sponsor an educational exhibition whilst simultaneously setting fire to young peoples futures?” This is beyond greenwash – it’s grotesque. We urgently need an ‘Energy Revolution’ to steer us away from the course of planetary destruction on which we are heading. We need a rapid, just transition to renewables – that revolution means an end to coal, and starts with the young people and scientists occupying this space this evening. Science tells us the truth, and the truth is that we must change.”
Naturalist Chris Packham at the Science Museum occupation 12 April 2024. Image: Extinction Rebellion.
The Energy Revolution gallery opened to the public just a few weeks ago amidst protest, with over 150 people taking part in a day of creative action. A few days earlier, guests arriving for the private VIP launch were greeted by protesters as they arrived, as well as the museum throwing a lavish dinner for the Adani Group’s billionaire chairman, Gautam Adani, with the Adani Group’s logo plastered on screens around the room.
To coincide with today’s protest, activists have released a new video exposing the truth behind the misleading claims made by Gautam Adani during his speech at the opening of the gallery. While he discussed the energy transition from oil and gas, he neglected to mention coal, the industry from which the Adani Group derives 60% of its revenue. The Science Museum has attempted to defend its sponsorship deal by claiming it has only partnered with the Green Energy division, although evidence clearly shows that it is directly linked to Adani’s coal business and that the museum has maintained a relationship with the main Adani Group.
At 2pm on Saturday, the occupiers will invite members of the public to join them for an interactive assembly inside the gallery to discuss alternatives to toxic fossil fuel sponsorship at the Science Museum. The group plans to tell the public the truth about the gallery’s sponsor and the urgency of keeping fossil fuels in the ground for a liveable future. Throughout their occupation, the protesters are also constructing sculptures of fragments of coal as a poignant reminder of Adani’s core polluting business.
Ian McDermott, a Chemistry teacher who will no longer organise school trips to the museum, has said: “For decades I ran a couple of trips to the museum a year, but I just don’t think it’s in the students’ interests to engage with the greenwashing of the companies destroying their futures.”
Protest placard reads Greenwash detected
Adani is the world’s largest private developer of new coal mines and coal-fired power plants, including Australia’s largest, the Carmichael Coal Mine built on Wangan and Jagalingou ancestral land. This ongoing investment in coal mining and power flies in the face of the scientific warning that most fossil fuel reserves cannot be burned and emitted if global warming increase is limited to 1.5°C, or even 2°C above pre industrial levels.
Anya, a young person occupying the gallery said: “To have a coal company sponsoring an exhibition on the future of energy is blatantly deceiving. Through this sponsorship deal, the Science Museum is helping Adani attach itself to the image of a positive and sustainable future when in reality it is a coal giant, weapons manufacturer and genocide supporter. It’s plain wrong for the Science Museum to be deceiving visitors, including young people like me, when it comes to the climate crisis.”
This is not the only instance of the museum welcoming fossil fuel companies to sponsor and influence its science education programmes and galleries. The Museum’s STEM Training Academy, which aims to support teachers in delivering science education, is sponsored by oil and gas giant BP, while the Museum’s interactive children’s gallery is named after Norwegian oil and gas company, Equinor.
Dr. Aaron Thierry, a scientist, who has researched climate impacts in the Arctic, is among those currently occupying the museum: “It’s not just Adani’s brand that the science museum is greenwashing, they’re also allowing the oil and gas giants BP and Equinor to sponsor their exhibits, disregarding the fact that these companies continue to expand fossil fuel production against the warnings of climate scientists. The latest science has shown we must leave the majority of fossil fuels unburned to prevent catastrophic changes to our climate. That an institution like the Science Museum is working with such rouge companies is a disgrace. The museum’s management needs to follow the example of Britain’s other leading cultural institutions and drop all ties to the fossil fuel industry.“
Scientists for Extinction Rebellion and Youth Action for Climate Justice (who have led this action) are members of Fossil Free Science Museum Coalition who are campaigning for the Science Museum to end its sponsorship by fossil fuel companies.
Youth Action for Climate Justice (formerly UKSCN London) is a radical youth organisation mobilising for climate justice. YACJ aims to create a new generation of young activists who are educated about society and the change we need, in order to work with other movements to change the system we live in. The group was previously part of Youth Strike for Climate Movement and coordinated the London youth climate strikes in 2019 and 2020, which brought thousands of young people to the streets of London. Instagram | Twitter
Other groups involved are: International Solidarity for Academic Freedom in India (InSAF India), India Labour Solidarity (UK), Students for Survival; and numerous Extinction Rebellion groups.
People collect plastic waste at a landfill in North Sumatra, Indonesia on March 27, 2024. (Photo: Kartik Byma/AFP via Getty Images)
“The question for every government now is this—will you negotiate a treaty to protect the health of your people; or will you negotiate a treaty to protect the profits of the fossil fuel industry?”
A report released Thursday estimates that countries worldwide are on pace to generate 220 million tonnes of total plastic waste this year, a finding that comes as governments are set to convene in Ottawa, Canada later this month to hash out a binding global treaty to limit the toxic pollution that is inundating waterways and communities across the planet.
The new report from EA – Earth Action (EA) projects that Plastic Overshoot Day—the point at which the amount of plastic waste produced exceeds the capacity of global management systems—will arrive on September 5 this year. Over a third of the total plastic waste created this year will end up in nature, according to the analysis.
On average, each person globally contributes 28 kilograms of plastic pollution per year. Previous research has shown that just 20 companies are responsible for more than half of the world’s total single-use plastic waste.
“The findings are unequivocal; improvements in waste management capacity are outpaced by rising plastic production, making progress almost invisible,” EA co-CEO Sarah Perreard said in a statement Thursday, criticizing the “assumption that recycling and waste management capacity will solve the plastics crisis.”
That assumption has been peddled for decades by the fossil fuel industry, which has a major interest in thwarting attempts to curb the production, use, and waste of plastics. Nearly all plastic is made from chemicals sourced from fossil fuels.
Sian Sutherland, co-founder of A Plastic Planet, said the new report underscores that “plastic pollution has set humanity on the road to ecological and humanitarian disaster.”
“We have a narrow window of opportunity this year to create a global plastics treaty that will protect not only our ocean, our air, our soil but our own children,” said Sutherland. “The question for every government now is this—will you negotiate a treaty to protect the health of your people; or will you negotiate a treaty to protect the profits of the fossil fuel industry? Viable solutions are already available at scale, giving us materials and systems that work in harmony with nature, not against it.”
“Close to 50% of the world’s population currently lives in areas where waste generated has already exceeded the capacity to manage it.”
Late last year, the third round of U.N. plastics treaty talks ended without a breakthrough as major oil-producing countries such as Saudi Arabia obstructed the proceedings, the fossil fuel industry worked to sabotage the negotiations, and the U.S. declined to forcefully push for a global pact that meaningfully curtails plastics production.
The U.S. is among the world’s leading generators of plastic waste, producing nearly 100 kilograms per capita each year. The U.S. and other rich nations also export tremendous amounts of plastic waste around the world, undercutting efforts to tackle the pollution crisis.
A Greenpeace International survey released earlier this month found that two-thirds of the U.S. public wants a global plastics treaty that bans single-use plastic packaging. A separate poll commissioned by WWF and the Plastic Free Foundation showed that 88% of global citizens support banning “unnecessary single-use plastic products” such as shopping bags.
In an op-ed for Euronews Green on Thursday, Perreard of EA wrote that “whilst policy has been mooted, schemes devised, and initiatives launched, plastic has continued to rise, and our planet and its people have sat under an ever-darkening cloud of pollution that showers its toxic consequences upon us.”
“Close to 50% of the world’s population currently lives in areas where waste generated has already exceeded the capacity to manage it, with the figure projected to rise to 66% by 5 September,” Perreard noted. “With the fourth round of negotiations in Ottawa at the end of this month, we can no longer ignore the facts, we can no longer afford to resist the change that should be set in motion through the treaty.”
Greta Thunberg was detained by police in The Hague along with other climate protesters. Photograph: Peter Dejong/AP
Greta Thunberg was detained by police at a demonstration in The Hague, in the Netherlands.
The climate activist was put in a bus by local police along with other protesters who tried to block a major highway into the city on Saturday.
Thunberg had joined a protest by hundreds of activists and was detained when she joined a group of about 100 people who tried to block the A12 highway.
Before she was detained, Thunberg said: “We are in a planetary emergency and we are not going to stand by and let people lose their lives and livelihood and be forced to become climate refugees when we can do something.”
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The Extinction Rebellion campaign group said before the demonstration that the activists would block a main highway into The Hague, but a heavy police presence, including officers on horseback, initially prevented the activists from getting on to the road.
A small group of people managed to sit down on another road and were detained after ignoring police orders to leave.
Extinction Rebellion activists have blocked the highway that runs past the temporary home of the Dutch parliament more than 30 times to protest against subsidies.
The demonstrators waved flags and chanted: “We are unstoppable, another world is possible.”
The Guardian article didn’t make clear that Dutch Extinction Rebellion is continuing it’s campaign against huge fossil fuel subsidies by the Dutch government that support the fossil fuel industry.
