Its not uncommon for Manchester’s Leaders to evoke the
city’s industrial heritage and spirit of innovation.
Manchester
is the home of The (Manchester) Guardian, the first computer with memory, the
first ‘nuclear-free’ city. It has a history
of ‘firsts’.
Manchester is also arguably known as the first
industrial city, with the advent of the cotton industry, mechanical
innovation, the building of factories and a huge increase in population transforming
the conurbation and the country.
Of the many things written
about Manchester at the time it was described as a ‘great city rising before
us as the very symbol of civilization, foremost in the march of improvement, a grand
incarnation of progress.’ [Chambers' Edinburgh Journal, 1858;
quoted by Briggs, Victorian Cities, 88]
But at the same time it was described ‘Earth and air
seem impregnated with fog and soot. The factories extend their flanks of fouler
brick one after another, bare, with shutterless windows, like economical and
colossal prisons’ [Girouard, Cities and People, 257-258]
In describing Manchester as that first industrial city
which influenced the world, so it can be argued that the origins of man-made
Climate Change also began in this city.
This city, as much as any, needs to take ‘Climate Change’ and its effects as seriously as the global threat it is.
In the same way that Manchester has historically been a technological and
cultural leader, today it needs to be an environmental one.
The recently released Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
(IPCC) report's focus was to look at ways of
reducing the effects of climate change. Its message is that
catastrophic climate change can be averted without sacrificing living standards.
It suggests that the transformation required to a world of clean energy is
eminently affordable. The implication of this statement is that action is ‘doable’,
it’s possible, if action is taken quickly.
As a central and influential organisation in the region, Manchester
City Council has been notable for
- Aggressive expansion of its airport interests (Manchester Airport Group)
- Fiddling of its own carbon emission reports
- Being fined by the European Union for breaking pollution laws
- Under-resourcing of its own Manchester: A Certain Future climate change organisation
Manchester Green Party has been critical of the Council for this particularly as its actions or inaction are ultimately political decisions.
We call upon Manchester City Council to
- take IPCC report seriously
- properly resource and focus carbon and pollution reduction emission actions and environmental improvement actions so that they maximise climate improvement not economic growth
- engage fully with long-term advocates of climate change actions such as The Tyndall Centre, Dr Kevin Anderson, Manchester ClimateMonthly, Steady State Manchester, MERCi, Friends of the Earth amongst others.
Manchester was also home of Emmeline Pankhurst
the leading Suffragette.
Their motto was ‘Deeds not Words’.
That is the spirit the City’s Leaders need to evoke.
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