Mayor plans to encourage Pope to continue climate-change fight

Vancouver Mayor Gregor Robertson says he plans on encouraging the Pope to ramp up pressure on international governments to take action on climate change when he meets the Catholic leader later this month.

Robertson will join about 30 other representatives of cities from Europe, Africa, Asia and the Americas July 21 for a twoday visit with Pope Francis in Vatican City. He will be the only Canadian representative in the delegation of global municipal leaders.

“It’s telling that the Pope is reaching out to mayors as part of his direct-action agenda to tackle climate action and poverty, because we’re on the front lines of it and we’re committed to dealing with these challenges,” Robertson said in an interview.

“The Pope recognizes that mayors play a key role in leading communities to a better future — we’re where the rubber hits the road in taking care of cities and we’ve largely been left out of the conversation.”

Robertson levelled harsh words at the current Canadian government, saying it has “been in the bad books globally” because of inaction on the environmental front. National governments in general have failed to deliver solutions on climate change, he said.

“But at a city level there’s serious action and commitment and it’s important that the rest of the world understands that,” Robertson said.

Robertson referenced Vancouver’s commitment to converting the city to 100 per cent renewable energy, the city’s calls for binding targets on climate pollution and its ambition of being recognized as the world’s greenest city.

The mayor, who isn’t Catholic and doesn’t follow any organized religion, said he was humbled to be included on the pontiff’s invite list.

The invitation comes in the wake of the Pope’s encyclical on climate change released last month, which blamed climate change on a fossil fuelbased “structurally perverse” economy that favours a culture of consumption at the expense of the world’s poor.