“New ideas to solve the big issues of our time” is the theme of this year’s Ethical Consumer conference, with sessions on how to rethink the role of the consumer and regenerative and mission-led business.

Get tickets now!

Speakers include Andy Goldring, chief executive of the Permaculture Association who will discuss innovative systems and Rachel Mountain from Ethex, on choosing an ethical investment.

A panel including Kate Sandle, community manager at B-Corp and Charlie Wigglesworth, deputy chief executive at Social Enterprise UK, will debate different types of innovative company.

Palm oil, plastics, tax avoidance, ethical finance and how to market your ethical business will also be discussed. The full programme is available here.

The conference will be held from 10am – 6pm on 12 October at the Amnesty International Resource Center, Shoreditch, London.

Tickets cost £22.50, including a vegan or vegetarian lunch, and are available online. To gain your 20 percent discount, use the code TheEcologist.

The conference is sponsored by vegetarian food co-operative, Suma Wholefoods.

This Author

Catherine Early is chief reporter for The Ecologist.

A Labour government would set a target for UK emissions to be slashed to “net zero” by the middle of the century, boosting ambition from the current 80 percent set in the Climate Change Act.

The party says it will ensure that 60 percent of energy to be from low carbon or renewable sources within 12 years of coming to power – up from around 10 percent now, bring back the zero carbon homes target scrapped by the Conservatives and table a Clean Air Act, according to its environment manifesto published at the weekend ahead of its annual conference.

Labour said that tackling the drivers of environmental degradation would require a “fundamental rebalancing of economic power”. Economic decisions should be made by the many who will suffer the consequences of climate change, rather than the few who have benefited from it.

Rebalancing economic power

The party wants to bring the water, rail and energy sectors back into public ownership, arguing that this would lower bills while providing investment.

Funding for farming and fishing should be reconfigured to support sustainable practices, smaller traders, local economies and community benefits, it said.

It reiterated its promise to ban fracking, as is the case in France and Germany. Any airport expansion would have to pass tests on noise and air pollution, while staying within the UK’s climate change obligations and meeting growth across the country, it said.

Greenpeace praised the manifesto’s ambition on fracking, onshore wind, home energy efficiency and public transport. It was also pleased with a commitment to review the UK’s fishing quota to support low-impact fishing, which it said would benefit the UK’s coastal communities.

However, Greenpeace UK head of politics Rebecca Newsom pointed out the lack of policy on waste and plastic pollution.

“Labour should introduce a progressive waste and resource strategy that requires corporate producers of waste to cut the amount they churn out and take full responsibility for disposing safely of the rest,” she said.

This Author

Catherine Early is a freelance environmental journalist and chief reporter for The Ecologist. She was formerly the deputy editor of the Environmentalist. She can be found tweeting at @Cat_Early76. 

Delays to maintenance at 13 Ministry of Defence run nuclear sites has created a ‘ticking time bomb’, a powerful House of Commons committee has warned.

The Public Accounts Committee highlighted a potential £20 billion shortfall in the MoD’s overall equipment programmes and has questioned the ability of the MoD to meet its national security commitments.

The Committee has already warned about a £2.9billion ‘affordability gap’ for the ‘Nuclear Enterprise’ which includes the Trident replacement submarines – Dreadnought.

Spending requirements

Now it has highlighted that when the subs are built there will be nowhere to berth them. Devonport and Rosyth dockyards are already full of old subs, some of which still contain nuclear fuel.

Kate Hudson, general secretary of CND, said: “We welcome this very frank PAC report which puts MoD incompetence and negligence in the spotlight.

“It’s clear that the MoD is overreaching itself financially: it clearly cannot afford to buy a new nuclear weapons system and maintain its other spending requirements. Spending on Trident replacement when it can’t afford general equipment is grossly irresponsible.

Common sense

“Even worse are the health and safety risks presented by years of MoD inactivity. There is a backlog of subs waiting to be dismantled, some of which contain nuclear fuel waste that will be radioactive for thousands of years.

“No permanent safe storage facility has yet been found, but our government chooses to produce more of this toxic waste through a nuclear weapons system that it cannot afford.

“This PAC report must ring alarm bells at the highest levels. The common sense solution is to cancel Trident replacement.”

This Author

Marianne Brooker is a contributing editor to The Ecologist.

Basking sharks are the second largest fish in the world. They can reach lengths up to 10m, and have previously had a reputation for being slow and languid as they scour the sea for their staple diet of plankton. Hundreds of basking sharks live off the shores of Cornwall, Ireland and Scotland.

Researchers used video analysis for basking sharks and great white sharks to estimate vertical swimming speeds at the moment of leaving the water. They also fitted one large basking shark with a data recording device to measure speed and movement.

At one point during the deployment of the recording device, in just over nine seconds and 10 tail beats, the basking shark accelerated from a depth of 28m to the surface, breaking through the water at nearly 90 degrees. The shark cleared the water for one second and peaked at a height of 1.2 m above the surface.

Athletic speeds

To achieve this breach, the basking shark exhibited a six fold increase in tail beat frequency and attained a top speed of approx. 5.1 m/s. This is more than twice as fast as the average competitor in the Olympic men’s 50m freestyle swim.

The videos of basking sharks and great whites breaching showed similar speeds of breaching in other individuals. The basking shark videos were recorded in 2015 at Malin Head, Ireland. The white shark videos were recorded in 2009 at two sites in South Africa, during predation attempts on Cape fur seals using seal shaped decoys.

Lewis Halsey, a reader in the Department of Life Sciences at the University of Roehampton and one of the scientists involved, said: “The results of the research put the basking shark in a new athletic light.

“While there are no recorded incidents of them being of danger to swimmers or small boats, unlike the great white shark, we now know they do have an impressive ability to swim at great speeds and jump clear of the water.”

The research team comprised Queen’s University Belfast, University of Roehampton, Trinity College Dublin, University of Cape Town, Irish Basking Shark Study Group and the South African Institute for Aquatic Biodiversity.

This Author

Marianne Brooker is a contributing editor for The Ecologist. This story was based on a press release from the University of Roehampton. 

The Lancashire ‘Nanas‘ are thus named because they’re motivated by grandchildren – everyone’s grandchildren. When John Kerry signed the Paris Agreement, he made a point by sitting his two-year-old granddaughter on his lap.

But the impact of climate change on children has already begun. As UNICEF have reported: “From natural disasters to the creeping impacts of rising sea levels and changing rain fall patterns, climate change threatens children’s most basic rights, including their health, access to food and water, education – even their survival.” 

As an author in school, I’ve noticed touching displays about polar bears, and photos of children working to earn the title Eco School – usually by recycling and reducing energy use.

Sensitive topics

One primary teacher told me: “Our Eco Warriors have been involved in working with the council to address fly tipping in the streets, and have written to the school milk provider to ask for paper straws instead of plastic.” 

I asked teachers how climate change is addressed in the classroom and informally when children raise the issue. Another primary teacher explained: “In Key Stage Two there is obvious sensitivity around political and cultural issues – I have been ticked off for openly discussing my political views with my year 6 class, so whether explicit teaching of climate change is deliberately avoided in Key Stage Two, I don’t know.”

But he added, “Children do ask about it and I’d be morally wrong if I didn’t allow them to discuss issues. Typically, they are beautifully black and white about it. I remember one girl exclaiming about how stupid it was to agree more nuclear power stations when energy can be safely harnessed from wind and solar.”

Clearly, with the subject missing from the early curriculum, there are no guidelines for teachers to use when asked about climate change by those most vulnerable to its impact.

In 2013 the UK Government removed climate change from the Key Stage One and Key Stage Two curriculum to the dismay of many, including the government’s former science adviser, Professor Sir David King. 

But The Royal Geographical Society said that the draft geography programme of study would provide “a sound underpinning of factual knowledge to prepare, at GCSE and A level, for pupils to study the topics that confront us all, globally, as citizens and which are inherently geographical, such as climate change.”

BBC Bite Size Chemistry (OCR Gateway) stated: “There are international treaties aimed at reducing the emissionsof carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. However, even if these emissions should fall significantly, it would take a long time for the Earth’s temperature to stabilise then decrease.” It then identifies ways to mitigate the impact of climate change.

Mental health

I found another revision site, this time for GCSE Geography, where environmental impacts of climate change are listed alongside economic impacts as if these are of equal importance.

The tone is low key rather than alarmist. But the data, including the graph by Robert A. Rhode showing 2000 year temperature comparison, must be enough to frighten any teenager studying it – which brings us to a problem.

In 2009 the film Age of Stupid shocked me to the core. I believed that every adult in the world should watch it, but balked at the idea of showings in school. Children, while more at risk than adults, are not in a position of power to change outcomes.

In 2016 we learned that rates of depression and anxiety among teenagers had increased by 70 percent in the previous twenty-five years; a decade or so ago, a friend’s teenage son said she had no idea what it was like to grow up in a world under threat from global warming. 

Fiction can carry truth, and fantasy and allegory (like my fracking novel The Dreamer) can make the point less brutally. But I was told my YA climate change novel Start was “a bucket of iced water over the head”. 

I’m aware that when young people recognise the failure of governments to protect their right to life, they are profoundly shocked. One teacher, asked about his own young sons, said: “My boys do worry.” Another teenager said: “It’s very bad and the worst thing is it affects the animals that don’t have an opinion and are becoming extinct.” And another said that climate change spelled “disaster and the beginning of the end of the world” and that he worries about it. 

Active hope

A school librarian at a comprehensive school asked visitors to her library for their thoughts about climate change and was told: “We need to stop it but we are not going to be alive to see the effects,” by one student, while others were more concerned: “We need to stop using greenhouse gases” and “Everyone needs to do a little bit to make a change. For example use electric cars. If everyone changes then we can stop it.” 

Another teenager said: “It’s very bad and the worst thing is it affects the animals that don’t have an opinion and are becoming extinct.” Another said that climate change spelled “disaster and the beginning of the end of the world” and that he worries about it. 

As adults we don’t have to be climate scientists to come face to face on a daily basis with climate events and predictions that could reasonably cause despair. There are books, like Joanna Macy and Chris Johnstone’s Active Hope, which have helped me, like my Quaker faith. However, I know a young man, highly educated and of a sunny disposition, who thinks “we’re fucked”, and tells me his university friends think so too.

What of children too young to be inspired by Macy or Naomi Klein, dependent on their parents for their security? What are parents to tell children, when they ask or even if they don’t?

My brother Dave Hampton, a carbon coach, has given many talks in school since 2005. A piece of his will appear in a leaflet called OK OurKids. He drew my attention to Dr Heidi Edmonds and Climate Kiss in Australia: a rather gentler easing in to truth than NASA’s Climate Kids.

There are apps, and plenty of videos on YouTube that parents can view with a child, managing questions as honestly but kindly as they can. Those who look for technological solutions will stress the importance of science and creative problem solving as a positive slant. Others may focus on equipping young people with ways to handle knowledge, such as meditation or mindfulness, and support groups, online or physical, where they can share fears and hope.

Radical change

Children will want to do something about what they have processed – like those school Eco Warriors – and achievable objectives have obvious advantages for wellbeing as well as society. It may be a mistake to limit that action to the anodyne or disingenuous – a sort of eco equivalent of going along with the Santa myth for their own benefit.

Just as I always feel hugely heartened by protesting with others who share my ideals, the young will surely be encouraged by taking part in activism for something in which they believe – like the thrilling #ThisIsZeroHour youth of America.

Fifteen year old Bella Lack, a contributor to The Ecologist, made an inspiring speech outside Downing Street for the UK Youth Climate Coalition’s March this summer – added to this, I have seen that children as young as eight can express themselves with passion and clarity. And there are other ways to campaign. 

A trial date for Juliana v. United States has been set for 29 October in Eugene, Oregon. The plaintiffs, aged 10 – 20, include the granddaughter of climate scientist James Hansen, formerly of NASA, and argue that the government, “through its affirmative actions in creating a national energy system that causes climate change, has violated their constitutional rights to life, liberty, and property, and has failed to protect essential public trust resources.”

British children could make a similar case as the UK government continues to pursue its policy of fracking against the will of local communities and the wider public – a policy inconsistent with Paris targets. It is up to the grownups in government to face reality as presented by climate and medical science, and ban a practice which puts short-term gain for the grownups ahead of the safety of children.

Long ago before we had a television, my dad protected me from the world news by keeping the paper he read on his train home out of bounds.

Now children can learn more about climate change from social media than the press or television. As adults we must tell them what we believe to be the truth, empower them to act as they feel they must, and help them hold on to hope. We owe it to younger generations to work tirelessly to safeguard their future.

If governments won’t fulfil this basic duty, they are negligent, and we must tell them so, accuse them of ecocide, stop them fracking and drive radical change. Enough damage has been done, and those who haven’t caused it cannot be allowed to pay the price of our mistakes. 

This Author

Sue Hampton is an author writing fiction for children, teenagers and adults, all underpinned by green values. She lives in Berkhamsted, Herts, where she is a Trustee for People not Borders supporting refugees, a Green Party member and a co-founder of Plastic-Free Berko.

Michael Mann’s submersion into climate research coincided with a global groundswell. In 1993, he set about trying to establish when the global temperatures had last risen so high or so rapidly.

Two years later, in December 1995, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) completed its second major report and published it during the first weeks of the following year.

Bert Bolin, the IPCC chairman, used his foreword to express his increasing frustration at the allegations being flung at the IPCC by climate sceptics and to defend its laborious and painstaking processes, rather than setting out the findings and implications for governments around the world.

IPCC defensive

The free market, oil funded climate deniers had already forced Bolin onto the defensive. “The reader may note that the IPCC is a fully intergovernmental, scientific-technical body,” he explained.  

The IPCC was extremely cautious and – five years after its first report – would only record that the signal of global warming, amid the natural chaos of weather, was only just emerging.

Despite no strong signal emerging from the climate science community, the late Professor Stephen Schneider, a Stanford University climatologist, well understood that the latest report was “fraught with political significance”.

He believed that President Bill Clinton was about to announce that America would finally agree to binding emissions cuts.

Emission targets

Tony Blair was elected Britain’s prime minister in May 1997 and followed in Conservative John Major’s climate footsteps.

During his first month in office, he flew to the G8 Summit of world leaders in Denver, as well as an environmental conference in New York, where he met Vice President Al Gore and used a keynote address to attack climate polluters.

Referring to agreements made at the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, he said Britain was among only three countries to stabilise its carbon emissions.

“Some other countries cannot say the same, including some of the great industrialised nations,” he said. “To them I say this: our targets will not be taken seriously by the poorer countries until the richer countries are meeting them. The biggest responsibilities falls on those countries with the biggest emissions.”

Professor Bob Watson, a cheerful grey-bearded British atmospheric chemist, was made chairman of the IPCC in 1997.

A dynamic leader

Watson had impeccable scientific credentials, and, even more remarkably, combined these with a commanding and believable media presence.

He had been chief scientist for the Office of Mission to Planet Earth at NASA before being hired by the president to advise at the White House.

He was described by the New York Times as an “outspoken advocate of the idea that human actions – mainly burning coal and oil – are contributing to global warming and must be changed to avert environmental upheavals.”

His clear scientific analysis and managerial aptitude ensured that the IPCC would resist the snipe fire from their sceptic adversaries.

The leaders of the two nations that had historically produced the most carbon emissions were poised to take radical action, while the scientific body that informed such action itself had a new, dynamic leader.

This Author

Brendan Montague is editor of The Ecologist, founder of Request Initiative and co-author of Impact of Market Forces on Addictive Substances and Behaviours: The web of influence of addictive industries (Oxford University Press). He tweets at @EcoMontague. This article first appeared at Desmog.uk.

“I’ve never seen a hedgehog, and that’s not from a lack of trying.” Bella Lack, the 15-year-old youth ambassador for the Born Free Foundation, told a shocked audience at the Lush Showcase in Manchester yesterday.

Speaking on a panel alongside Chris Packham the day after his 10,000-strong People’s Walk for Wildlife, she added: “I’ve only seen hedgehogs through video, and I’ve only heard some birdsong through audio recordings.”

The conservationists were discussing the rapid decline in biodiversity in the UK, including the dramatic reduction in insect and birdlife. The audience was told that 15 percent of UK species are now threatened with extinction – making Britain one of the most nature depleted countries in the world.

Morally wrong

Packham, conservationist and presenter of TV favourite Springwatch, explained why he felt “he had no choice” but to call for the national demonstration in Central London having felt let down by environmental charities, including the RSPCA with him he serves as the vice president. 

“It is time to take this onto the streets,” he said, before then referring to his People’s Manifesto for Wildlife. “We have got to instigate some change, and to do that we have to offer some solutions.”

He described his frustration that the changes that could prevent the loss of biodiversity were “Not rapid enough, or broad enough in scale”. He said ecologists and conservationists were “very often focused on the one thing that interests us, that passion. We lose sight of the fact that that single passion is linked to pretty much everything else.”

He added: The greatest beauty of nature is that interconnectivity, is that balance, is that harmony. But it is hard for us to find it, because we have damaged it. If we destroy our natural environment, then we cannot exploit it – we won’t be able to grow food.

“But we also have a conscience – we know what we are doing is morally wrong, so why should we be comfortable with that.” 

Business interests

He concluded: “We have the medicine, but we have failed to apply it. I don’t want to have that on my conscience. I don’t want to have wholly failed. Do we really want to fail ourselves, and fail this planet. Do we want that to happen to our generation.”

Bella, who wrote on behalf of young people in the manifesto, and who is also a regular contributor to The Ecologist – emphasised the point by saying she had not seen the birds and animals that were common in Britain in Packham’s lifetime.

She said: “Our wildlife is being completely decimated. But there is still so much left – and that is what inspires me. It is so important that young people are decision makes and they are involved. Not just preserve wildlife for future generations, but to persevere it with them as well.”

She argued that humans are born with a fascination for wildlife, but that this can be lost. When lost, it needed to be rekindled. “I’ve never seen a very young child who is not fascinated by a worm, or a colony of ants,” she concluded.

Dr Mark Avery, was the uplands minister writing for the manifesto and has worked in conservation for 25 years. He said on the Stop the War on Wildlife march: “Yesterday will stay in my memory for a very long time. I think it is right to think of it as a war. Big business interests who do not give a toss. We are going to have to piss some people off. It’s not all about being nice.

Habitats for wildlife

He added: “We’ve got a get a gang together and get out and change things. If the government does not want to give you more wildlife, if industry does not want to give you more wildlife, then being right is not enough. I do not mean throwing stones…but we’re going to have to tool up.”

Dominic Dyer, the chief executive of the Badger Trust and author Badgered to Death, told the audience: I was in those meetings with ministers and Prime Ministers, I did those backroom deals.

“I do understand how industry and government work, and the danger of when they work so close together. I changed my outlook, and thinking, and career, to put my skills to better use for wildlife. If we do not change the way our government works, and how our economy works, and how we live our lives, we are going to lose an enormous amount of wildlife.”

Kate Bradbury, author of the Bumblebee Flies Anyway, said: “We’re lobbying government, effectively. So many of these things, we cannot change as individuals – we have to lobby government and get these changes. At the same time, the actual urban spaces in and around our homes, we as individuals have the ability to make those changes and improve those habitats for wildlife.”

The speakers were talking at the Stop the War on Wildlife Debate at the Lush Showcase yesterday. The showcase continues today. 

This Author

Brendan Montague is editor of The Ecologist, founder of Request Initiative and co-author of Impact of Market Forces on Addictive Substances and Behaviours: The web of influence of addictive industries (Oxford University Press). He tweets at @EcoMontague.

“I’ve never seen a hedgehog, and that’s not from a lack of trying.” Bella Lack, the 15-year-old youth ambassador for the Born Free Foundation, told a shocked audience at the Lush Showcase in Manchester yesterday.

Speaking on a panel alongside Chris Packham the day after his 10,000-strong People’s Walk for Wildlife, she added: “I’ve only seen hedgehogs through video, and I’ve only heard some birdsong through audio recordings.”

The conservationists were discussing the rapid decline in biodiversity in the UK, including the dramatic reduction in insect and birdlife. The audience was told that 15 percent of UK species are now threatened with extinction – making Britain one of the most nature depleted countries in the world.

Morally wrong

Packham, conservationist and presenter of TV favourite Springwatch, explained why he felt “he had no choice” but to call for the national demonstration in Central London having felt let down by environmental charities, including the RSPCA with him he serves as the vice president. 

“It is time to take this onto the streets,” he said, before then referring to his People’s Manifesto for Wildlife. “We have got to instigate some change, and to do that we have to offer some solutions.”

He described his frustration that the changes that could prevent the loss of biodiversity were “Not rapid enough, or broad enough in scale”. He said ecologists and conservationists were “very often focused on the one thing that interests us, that passion. We lose sight of the fact that that single passion is linked to pretty much everything else.”

He added: The greatest beauty of nature is that interconnectivity, is that balance, is that harmony. But it is hard for us to find it, because we have damaged it. If we destroy our natural environment, then we cannot exploit it – we won’t be able to grow food.

“But we also have a conscience – we know what we are doing is morally wrong, so why should we be comfortable with that.” 

Business interests

He concluded: “We have the medicine, but we have failed to apply it. I don’t want to have that on my conscience. I don’t want to have wholly failed. Do we really want to fail ourselves, and fail this planet. Do we want that to happen to our generation.”

Bella, who wrote on behalf of young people in the manifesto, and who is also a regular contributor to The Ecologist – emphasised the point by saying she had not seen the birds and animals that were common in Britain in Packham’s lifetime.

She said: “Our wildlife is being completely decimated. But there is still so much left – and that is what inspires me. It is so important that young people are decision makes and they are involved. Not just preserve wildlife for future generations, but to persevere it with them as well.”

She argued that humans are born with a fascination for wildlife, but that this can be lost. When lost, it needed to be rekindled. “I’ve never seen a very young child who is not fascinated by a worm, or a colony of ants,” she concluded.

Dr Mark Avery, was the uplands minister writing for the manifesto and has worked in conservation for 25 years. He said on the Stop the War on Wildlife march: “Yesterday will stay in my memory for a very long time. I think it is right to think of it as a war. Big business interests who do not give a toss. We are going to have to piss some people off. It’s not all about being nice.

Habitats for wildlife

He added: “We’ve got a get a gang together and get out and change things. If the government does not want to give you more wildlife, if industry does not want to give you more wildlife, then being right is not enough. I do not mean throwing stones…but we’re going to have to tool up.”

Dominic Dyer, the chief executive of the Badger Trust and author Badgered to Death, told the audience: I was in those meetings with ministers and Prime Ministers, I did those backroom deals.

“I do understand how industry and government work, and the danger of when they work so close together. I changed my outlook, and thinking, and career, to put my skills to better use for wildlife. If we do not change the way our government works, and how our economy works, and how we live our lives, we are going to lose an enormous amount of wildlife.”

Kate Bradbury, author of the Bumblebee Flies Anyway, said: “We’re lobbying government, effectively. So many of these things, we cannot change as individuals – we have to lobby government and get these changes. At the same time, the actual urban spaces in and around our homes, we as individuals have the ability to make those changes and improve those habitats for wildlife.”

The speakers were talking at the Stop the War on Wildlife Debate at the Lush Showcase yesterday. The showcase continues today. 

This Author

Brendan Montague is editor of The Ecologist, founder of Request Initiative and co-author of Impact of Market Forces on Addictive Substances and Behaviours: The web of influence of addictive industries (Oxford University Press). He tweets at @EcoMontague.

“I’ve never seen a hedgehog, and that’s not from a lack of trying.” Bella Lack, the 15-year-old youth ambassador for the Born Free Foundation, told a shocked audience at the Lush Showcase in Manchester yesterday.

Speaking on a panel alongside Chris Packham the day after his 10,000-strong People’s Walk for Wildlife, she added: “I’ve only seen hedgehogs through video, and I’ve only heard some birdsong through audio recordings.”

The conservationists were discussing the rapid decline in biodiversity in the UK, including the dramatic reduction in insect and birdlife. The audience was told that 15 percent of UK species are now threatened with extinction – making Britain one of the most nature depleted countries in the world.

Morally wrong

Packham, conservationist and presenter of TV favourite Springwatch, explained why he felt “he had no choice” but to call for the national demonstration in Central London having felt let down by environmental charities, including the RSPCA with him he serves as the vice president. 

“It is time to take this onto the streets,” he said, before then referring to his People’s Manifesto for Wildlife. “We have got to instigate some change, and to do that we have to offer some solutions.”

He described his frustration that the changes that could prevent the loss of biodiversity were “Not rapid enough, or broad enough in scale”. He said ecologists and conservationists were “very often focused on the one thing that interests us, that passion. We lose sight of the fact that that single passion is linked to pretty much everything else.”

He added: The greatest beauty of nature is that interconnectivity, is that balance, is that harmony. But it is hard for us to find it, because we have damaged it. If we destroy our natural environment, then we cannot exploit it – we won’t be able to grow food.

“But we also have a conscience – we know what we are doing is morally wrong, so why should we be comfortable with that.” 

Business interests

He concluded: “We have the medicine, but we have failed to apply it. I don’t want to have that on my conscience. I don’t want to have wholly failed. Do we really want to fail ourselves, and fail this planet. Do we want that to happen to our generation.”

Bella, who wrote on behalf of young people in the manifesto, and who is also a regular contributor to The Ecologist – emphasised the point by saying she had not seen the birds and animals that were common in Britain in Packham’s lifetime.

She said: “Our wildlife is being completely decimated. But there is still so much left – and that is what inspires me. It is so important that young people are decision makes and they are involved. Not just preserve wildlife for future generations, but to persevere it with them as well.”

She argued that humans are born with a fascination for wildlife, but that this can be lost. When lost, it needed to be rekindled. “I’ve never seen a very young child who is not fascinated by a worm, or a colony of ants,” she concluded.

Dr Mark Avery, was the uplands minister writing for the manifesto and has worked in conservation for 25 years. He said on the Stop the War on Wildlife march: “Yesterday will stay in my memory for a very long time. I think it is right to think of it as a war. Big business interests who do not give a toss. We are going to have to piss some people off. It’s not all about being nice.

Habitats for wildlife

He added: “We’ve got a get a gang together and get out and change things. If the government does not want to give you more wildlife, if industry does not want to give you more wildlife, then being right is not enough. I do not mean throwing stones…but we’re going to have to tool up.”

Dominic Dyer, the chief executive of the Badger Trust and author Badgered to Death, told the audience: I was in those meetings with ministers and Prime Ministers, I did those backroom deals.

“I do understand how industry and government work, and the danger of when they work so close together. I changed my outlook, and thinking, and career, to put my skills to better use for wildlife. If we do not change the way our government works, and how our economy works, and how we live our lives, we are going to lose an enormous amount of wildlife.”

Kate Bradbury, author of the Bumblebee Flies Anyway, said: “We’re lobbying government, effectively. So many of these things, we cannot change as individuals – we have to lobby government and get these changes. At the same time, the actual urban spaces in and around our homes, we as individuals have the ability to make those changes and improve those habitats for wildlife.”

The speakers were talking at the Stop the War on Wildlife Debate at the Lush Showcase yesterday. The showcase continues today. 

This Author

Brendan Montague is editor of The Ecologist, founder of Request Initiative and co-author of Impact of Market Forces on Addictive Substances and Behaviours: The web of influence of addictive industries (Oxford University Press). He tweets at @EcoMontague.

“I’ve never seen a hedgehog, and that’s not from a lack of trying.” Bella Lack, the 15-year-old youth ambassador for the Born Free Foundation, told a shocked audience at the Lush Showcase in Manchester yesterday.

Speaking on a panel alongside Chris Packham the day after his 10,000-strong People’s Walk for Wildlife, she added: “I’ve only seen hedgehogs through video, and I’ve only heard some birdsong through audio recordings.”

The conservationists were discussing the rapid decline in biodiversity in the UK, including the dramatic reduction in insect and birdlife. The audience was told that 15 percent of UK species are now threatened with extinction – making Britain one of the most nature depleted countries in the world.

Morally wrong

Packham, conservationist and presenter of TV favourite Springwatch, explained why he felt “he had no choice” but to call for the national demonstration in Central London having felt let down by environmental charities, including the RSPCA with him he serves as the vice president. 

“It is time to take this onto the streets,” he said, before then referring to his People’s Manifesto for Wildlife. “We have got to instigate some change, and to do that we have to offer some solutions.”

He described his frustration that the changes that could prevent the loss of biodiversity were “Not rapid enough, or broad enough in scale”. He said ecologists and conservationists were “very often focused on the one thing that interests us, that passion. We lose sight of the fact that that single passion is linked to pretty much everything else.”

He added: The greatest beauty of nature is that interconnectivity, is that balance, is that harmony. But it is hard for us to find it, because we have damaged it. If we destroy our natural environment, then we cannot exploit it – we won’t be able to grow food.

“But we also have a conscience – we know what we are doing is morally wrong, so why should we be comfortable with that.” 

Business interests

He concluded: “We have the medicine, but we have failed to apply it. I don’t want to have that on my conscience. I don’t want to have wholly failed. Do we really want to fail ourselves, and fail this planet. Do we want that to happen to our generation.”

Bella, who wrote on behalf of young people in the manifesto, and who is also a regular contributor to The Ecologist – emphasised the point by saying she had not seen the birds and animals that were common in Britain in Packham’s lifetime.

She said: “Our wildlife is being completely decimated. But there is still so much left – and that is what inspires me. It is so important that young people are decision makes and they are involved. Not just preserve wildlife for future generations, but to persevere it with them as well.”

She argued that humans are born with a fascination for wildlife, but that this can be lost. When lost, it needed to be rekindled. “I’ve never seen a very young child who is not fascinated by a worm, or a colony of ants,” she concluded.

Dr Mark Avery, was the uplands minister writing for the manifesto and has worked in conservation for 25 years. He said on the Stop the War on Wildlife march: “Yesterday will stay in my memory for a very long time. I think it is right to think of it as a war. Big business interests who do not give a toss. We are going to have to piss some people off. It’s not all about being nice.

Habitats for wildlife

He added: “We’ve got a get a gang together and get out and change things. If the government does not want to give you more wildlife, if industry does not want to give you more wildlife, then being right is not enough. I do not mean throwing stones…but we’re going to have to tool up.”

Dominic Dyer, the chief executive of the Badger Trust and author Badgered to Death, told the audience: I was in those meetings with ministers and Prime Ministers, I did those backroom deals.

“I do understand how industry and government work, and the danger of when they work so close together. I changed my outlook, and thinking, and career, to put my skills to better use for wildlife. If we do not change the way our government works, and how our economy works, and how we live our lives, we are going to lose an enormous amount of wildlife.”

Kate Bradbury, author of the Bumblebee Flies Anyway, said: “We’re lobbying government, effectively. So many of these things, we cannot change as individuals – we have to lobby government and get these changes. At the same time, the actual urban spaces in and around our homes, we as individuals have the ability to make those changes and improve those habitats for wildlife.”

The speakers were talking at the Stop the War on Wildlife Debate at the Lush Showcase yesterday. The showcase continues today. 

This Author

Brendan Montague is editor of The Ecologist, founder of Request Initiative and co-author of Impact of Market Forces on Addictive Substances and Behaviours: The web of influence of addictive industries (Oxford University Press). He tweets at @EcoMontague.