Where is our Greta?
By Ad astra  Here she is  looking at us, looking right into us, right into our soul, just as she was on the title page of the UK version of The Big Issue. Writing in it, Adrian Lobb begins:  In August 2018, Greta Thunberg took a stand. One small act of defiance for a 15-year-old Swedish girl became one giant global leap forward for change. One simple act of refusal  skipping school and sitting in silence outside the Swedish Parliament with a homemade placard saying: School Strike for the Climate  Thunberg sparked schoolchildren around the world into action. She was joined by hundreds of thousands of young people taking their first steps into activism, no longer able to tolerate the failure of a generation of politicians to act fast enough in response to the climate crisis. Its just spiralled out of control, Thunberg says, speaking from her home in Stockholmin one way it feels like it was yesterday. But on the other hand, it feels like it was 10 years ago  Here we have a schoolgirl doing what our politicians havent the guts to do  demand that we take immediate action to counter the climate change effects that we hear about from climate experts every day  on radio, on TV, on current affairs programmes, on commentaries that play all night on our radios. We would need to be deaf or have tin ears to avoid their dire messages. Yet we have a PM who habitually seeks to avoid the issue, who refuses to commit to zero emissions by 2050, who bends to the demands of the array of climate change deniers that sit at his side, fearful of losing their conditional support  an obscene example of politically motivated cowardice. Ahead of official G7 talks, PM Morrison travelled to Cornwall for dialogue with the leaders of South Africa, South Korea and India about climate change, nature and open societies. G7 environment ministers had already agreed to deliver climate change targets in line with the Paris Agreement, which limits the rise in global temperatures to 1.5 degrees. On arrival there, in his typically grandiose style, Morrison announced: This is a very important place for Australia to be today as we touch down here in the United Kingdom to join the G7-plus dialogue. That was it! In The price of arrogance: we asked if you were embarrassed by Morrisons response to Bidens strident message to the climate change forum he sponsored: The signs are unmistakable. The science is undeniable. But the cost of inaction keeps mounting. Our PM shamed us by telling the world that he will run his own race irrespective of other countries and their opinions. With characteristic arrogance, he refused to bow to pressure from the US to use the summit to announce an increased target to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. He told an astonished summit: We are well on the way to meet our Paris commitments thereby exposing the enlarging gulf between Australia and its allies about how best to tackle the climate crisis. For good measure, Morrison added: Well update our long-term emissions reduction strategy in time for the Glasgow COP26 climate action conference, scheduled for November. Another nothing to see here move. Please offer your own nomination. Readers will be interested. For me, the one most like Greta is Penny Wong. Strong, articulate, well-informed, outspoken, believable. Shes my Greta! Youll like it even more knowing that your donation will help us to keep up the good fight. Chuck in a few bucks and see just how far it goes! Share this:  Tweet    Email  Print