We must take action on climate emergency

YOUR brief news article ‘Long, hot 2020’ (M.E.N., January 15) was a timely reminder that the Covid-19 pandemic is not the only crisis we face.

It pointed to analysis by the World Meteorological Organisation that last year tied with 2016 as the warmest on record, and that the world is now already 1.3 degrees warmer than before the Industrial Revolution.

More warming is to come, with enormous disruption to ecosystems, agriculture and much more.

On the same day, your reporter Niall Griffiths wrote about a proposal, to be discussed by Manchester council’s Executive next week, to spend money to reduce carbon emissions at the Aquatic Centre.

It would be great if the Executive would also think beyond these (much needed) infrastructural decisions to the more general questions of how to scale up, and scrutinise, climate action across all 32 wards of the city.

In the last two years alone, the city used up a quarter of its carbon budget for the entire 21st century.

On Tuesday, February 9, the Resources and Governance Scrutiny Committee will discuss our petition for the creation of a seventh scrutiny committee, dedicated to climate policy and its implementation.

We will be putting the case that the decision needs to go to a vote in Full Council, since the 94 councillors currently in post all voted to declare a climate emergency, back in July 2019.

Chloe Jeffries,

Climate Emergency Manchester