With massive banners bearing the slogan <End Fossil Fuels – Protect Public Health – Save Lives> and in front of three Covid-briefing-styled lecterns, a mock Prime Minister gave an emergency briefing, accompanied by his Chief Scientific Advisor, Chief Medical Advisor and a representative of the public emergency assembly. This was followed by questions from the press pack.
The event was organised by health workers deeply concerned about the health impacts of the climate crisis and the astonishing absence of any emergency action from government departments.
The protest was accompanied by an open letter to the Prime Minister, the Health Secretary, and the Food and Agriculture Minister, calling for an urgent joined-up approach to the Climate and Ecological Emergency with a massive public awareness campaign and transformative action.
The letter was by coalition of groups including the UK Health Alliance on Climate Change, Greener Practice CIC, Doctors Association UK, Medact, and several more protest and pressure groups.
Later the same day, a new banner accompanied a second briefing near the Dept of Environment, Food and Agricultural Affairs (DEFRA), followed again by press questions. The government has recently created a National Food Advisory Board, but activists are dismayed that most of the seats are taken by large corporate industry figures, when meat-intensive industrial farming and processed foods are a huge part of the problem.
The mock press briefings announced a series of measures which activists would like to see actually occur, among them rapid decarbonisation of the energy sector, an definite end to any new fossil fuel exploration, massive investment in insulation and low-carbon heating, subsidies and investment in public transport and active transport, and incentives and investment to move towards a far more plant-based farming future.
