Last Tuesday, the first stage of the proposed Climate Bill was passed by MSPs. Ahead of the first debate on the bill, activists gathered outside Scottish Parliament to call for more action for climate change. RSPB Scotland's Jim Densham discusses the importance of a strong and ambitious Climate Bill.
65% of people concerned about climate change because of the threat to wildlife
Last week RSPB colleagues and I joined hundreds of others outside the Scottish Parliament to call for more action to halt the current climate emergency. We took along some pictures of birds and wildlife to wave amongst the crowd and show that we are concerned about the threat that climate change is having on our precious wildlife.
The rally was organised by our partners in the Stop Climate Chaos Scotland coalition to coincide with MSPs debating the Climate Change Bill in Parliament. It was a great opportunity to make some noise and show our elected representatives that so many of us in Scotland want to see strong targets to reduce emissions in coming years and more action on things like transport, food production and home energy efficiency.
Also, this week we saw results of a YouGov poll which showed that 70% of people in Scotland want to see more action on climate change. The poll results proved that people are increasingly concerned about climate change with the second most common reason being the threat to wildlife - 65% of people expressed this concern.
Climate change is having a devastating effect on vulnerable wildlife, even now. Another news story this week reported on research which indicates that climate warming has caused spring to happen earlier over the past 50 years. One problem with this is that an earlier spring doesn’t affect all species equally so some get out of sync with their food sources at critical stages. We cannot let climate change do irreversible damage to our wildlife and intricate ecosystems. That’s why we need MSPs at Parliament to listen to the 70%, and those of us who love wildlife, and make the Climate Change Bill as strong and ambitious as possible.
As the Bill goes into its next stage in the coming months we will be doing more to talk about climate change and wildlife. There will be more opportunities for you to contact your MSPs, join us at rallies and make your voice heard. We need to do all we can to halt climate change now for ourselves, future generations and to protect our wonderful wildlife.