‘Greta is holding up a mirror to us’

Last week, a teenage climate activist captured the attention of the UK’S top politicians. Gaby Hinsliff explores the power of the ‘Greta effect’

THE ROOM WAS packed, the queue snaking down the corridor as MPS outside craned their necks to hear. Greta Thunberg, the 16-year-old who inspired a global movement of school strikes in protest against climate change, got Parliament’s version of rock-star treatment when she visited last week.

After she rebuked her audience of senior politicians for failing to stop global warming, the Environment Secretary Michael Gove said she had inspired in him ‘great admiration, but also responsibility and guilt’ for being part of a generation that hadn’t done enough. Jeremy Corbyn, who alongside other opposition party leaders held a separate meeting with Greta, also called her ‘inspiring’. While campaigners twice her age struggle to be heard over the noise of Brexit, something about Greta’s bravery and originality seems to be creating a tipping point.

Ed Miliband, the former Labour leader and ex-climate Change Secretary, was in the room and tells Grazia that it’s her ‘quietly understated but devastating’ manner that does it. ‘She’s holding a mirror up to us, and you look into that mirror and think, “She’s basically right.” Whether it’s [the eco-protest group] Extinction Rebellion or Greta, people know in their heart of hearts that the argument they’re making – which is that we are obsessed with everything else, particularly Brexit, but meanwhile we have got this absolute emergency which we have got very little time to get to grips with – is correct.’

But he also sees Greta – who was 15 when she started skipping school to stage sit-ins outside the Swedish parliament, and has credited her Asperger’s for her ability to think outside the box – as an important role model. ‘I’ve talked to my kids about it, that she’s willing to step outside the crowd when the much easier route would be to just go to school,’ says Miliband, who has sons aged eight and nine.

‘I felt more optimistic afterwards than I have done for some time, because I think it’s a bit like in 2007-8, when there was competition between the parties to get ahead on climate change. Even right-wing people are being very careful not to be too condemnatory.’

The Green MP Caroline Lucas, meanwhile, thinks Greta’s secret is refusing to overcomplicate things. ‘She simply says again and again, “Follow the science.” She’s uncompromising on that, and she never uses more words than are necessary – there’s something about her directness. There are times when you need that true north of the compass.’

The challenge, however, is keeping up momentum. Lucas, Corbyn and other opposition party leaders have agreed to regular meetings with the teenage leaders of climate strikes in British schools. It’s hoped that, this week, the Government’s expert advisers on climate change will recommend a target to reduce carbon emissions to zero, pushing Gove to act on those guilty feelings. As Lucas notes, it’s nice to feel optimistic for once, but optimism isn’t enough: ‘Greta explicitly says, “We don’t want your hope,” because adults are always saying to her, “Thank you for giving us hope.” But it’s false hope unless it’s based on action.’ Greta addressing politicians, including Environment Secretary Michael Gove (far left) and former Labour leader Ed Miliband