Lighting the candles for the Climate Emergency message outside St Martin-in-the-Fields
Lighting the candles for the Climate Emergency message outside St Martin-in-the-Fields
The all-night Climate Emergency Vigil started on the night of Saturday May 15th\, just over a week after the election\, with a Candlelit Procession down Whitehall from St Martin-in-the-Fields church\, Trafalgar Square.
A crowd had assembled from 11.00 pm outside the church where "\;Climate SOS"\; was spelled out in candles\, and numerous more candles were lit and placed in jars while flags and placards were distributed. \; Meanwhile inside the church itself a service organised by Christian Ecology was being held - there was a great turnout for it with nearly 100 attending\, to listen to the Rev. Chris Brice\, Social Justice advisor for London diocese and Mark Dowd from 'Operation Noah'.
At 12.00 midnight the candle-bearing masses streamed off past the great pillared facade of St Martin's behind the campaign's 7 foot square globe-in-a-greenhouse\, the \; CCC banner and another banner held by a long row of vigil-goers spelling out "\;Climate Emergency"\;. With candle-lights bobbing and flags waving the Procession made its way down Whitehall\, past Downing Street with newly re-occupied No. 10 to finish at 'Old Palace Yard' just opposite the Houses of Parliament. Here the crowd assembled around the statue of George V to be rewarded by a surprise appearance and inspiring speech from John McDonnell MP (whose constituency includes the village that had been threatened by the proposed 3rd Heathrow runway).
Photo galleries\:
![\\"\\"](\\"http\://farm2.static.flickr.com/1059/4611010175_82f580d5d1_s.jpg\\") Jack Kelly |
![\\"\\"](\\"http\://farm4.static.flickr.com/3364/4635278335_99a3c64fcc_s.jpg\\") Steve Merrick |
More speeches followed from Alex Farrow from the UKYCC\, Suzanne Dhaliwal and Melina Laboucan-Massimo from the Tar Sands campaign\, Becky Luff from The Spartans\, Phil Thornhill as campaign coordinator\, Mark Dowd from Operation Noah\, Peter Deane from Biofuelwatch\, Suzanne Jeffery on 'a million climate jobs' \, Chris from the Democracy Village and Duncan Law on behalf of Transition Towns - all admirably brief (!) and interpersed with musical interludes courtesy of Peter Deane\, Chris Bluemel\, Tony Black et al... \; \;
But the fun part was yet to come....
END:VEVENT BEGIN:VEVENT DTSTAMP;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20120524T161008Z DTSTART;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20100610T173000Z DTEND;VALUE=DATE-TIME:20100610T173000Z UID:http://www.campaigncc.org/node/401 URL;VALUE=URI:http://www.campaigncc.org/node/401 SUMMARY:Bolivian 'People's Climate Conference' - what does it mean for us? DESCRIPTION:
This was a Public Meeting held on Thursday 10th June in SOAS \; (School of Oriental and African Studies)\, London\, organised by CCC with the Climate Camp. It was focused around a report back and discussion on the...
Cochabama Climate Conference\:
"\;World People's Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth"\; held 19th-22nd April 2010.
35\,000 people attended this ground breaking event. Why ground-breaking? Because this is the first big sign that the developing world is waking up to the huge threat it faces from climate change and is beginning to mobilise in earnest against the massive injustice effectively being inflicted upon it by the rich nations of the North. Even while sceptics dominate the airwaves here in the UK\, anger at our role in stoking a global catstrophe is building... \; In any case\, 35\,000 people attended and debated the crisis and its solutions\, emerging with a declaration at the end that recommends tough\, scientifically realistic targets (1°\;C\, 300 ppm) like nothing seen in the UNFCCC negotiations. And CCC members were there - promoting the Global Day of Action on Climate (see more about this here).So also were folks from the Climate Camp. \;
The reports back came from a wide variety of \; perspectives and were followed by an interesting discussion involving just about everyone at the meeting. The Cochabamba conference will continue to be a source of inspiration for climate campaigners here in the UK !
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