Unions and activists link up to build mass climate movement

by LOUISE NOUSRATPOUR in Manchester
Tuesday September 23, 2008
The Morning Star

TRADE union and climate-change activists joined forces on Monday night to build a mass movement that would organise strikes and direct action to push ministers to adopt a low-carbon economy.

Speakers at the Convention of the Left stressed that the working class must be at the forefront of such a movement in order to take on the big corporations that control the world's resources and are the biggest polluters.

The threat of climate change is so great and urgent, speakers warned, that campaigns to encourage individual lifestyle changes, while admirable, will do little more than tinker around the edges.

Climate change academic Jonathan Neale said that "what we need is a mass campaign of workers and grass-roots organisations to transform the way we produce and consume energy."

Speakers agreed that the main focus must be on demands for the renationalisation of the energy sector and other key industries such as housing and transport.

Campaigners argued that the technology is available to shift the economy from being based on fossil fuels to one based on renewable energy.

They dismissed claims that a greener economy would mean massive job losses.

On the contrary, CWU senior deputy leader Tony Kearns argued, renewable energy would "create far more jobs."

The convention heard that wind power, for instance, creates 10 jobs per megawatt compared to one job per megawatt created in the fossil fuel industry.

Speakers said that it was understandable for trade unions with members in the nuclear and aviation industry to support job-creating airport expansions and plans for new nuclear power stations.

But anti-nuclear activist and scientist Martin Empson stressed that a united climate change campaign must bring the unions on board by making a strong case for the "huge potential" for job creation in the renewable sector.

Daniel Randall of Workers Climate Change, which grew out of the 2007 Heathrow climate camp, argued: "We need working-class solutions to the threat of climate change and trade unions must play the central role."