by Kennedy Graham
Yesterday some of the leading authorities in Australasia presented at the IPS conference on Biophysical Limits and their Policy Implications in Wellington. Some 300 people turned up. Two were members of Parliament. Both were from the Green Party.
As Whip (Musterer), I favoured myself with leave for the day. In the interests of balance, natural justice and self-preservation, I gave leave to co-leader, Russel Norman.
A third MP, the Minister for Climate Change, gave a (prepared) ministerial speech, answered some questions, and left.
Among other speakers:
- Dr Brian Walker spoke on planetary limits and missing institutions.
- Dr Graham Turner spoke on Revisiting the ‘Limits to Growth’: global and national strategies for sustainability.
- Dr Daniel Rutledge spoke on Global biophysical limits.
- Dr Steve Hatfield-Dodds spoke on Governance: challenges in reducing the risks and impacts of overshooting biophysical limits.
The prognosis is grim. In short, we are on the path to ecological (and then, possibly, civilizational) collapse by 2100, and possibly well before then.
These leading authorities, and others, presented researched, rigorous, and succinct depictions of the evidence to date (in their respective fields) and projections of business-as-usual (with variations reflecting some societal intervention on our part). Together, we all stared blankly, over the cliff.
There will some still around who will think we / I are being ‘alarmist’ with such talk. Those numbers are dwindling, and will continue to decrease.
The reality, increasingly stark, is that we have been under-estimating the magnitude of the global problem. And we have not acknowledged the prospect of its imminence.
All this is second-nature to Green members of Parliament. We have devoted effort, over the years, to calling attention to this plight. But those are political calls to action. These were the scientific calls to acknowledge the evidence.
What the conference did not explore was the challenge of finding solutions (beyond calling for a research agenda).
In my Budget Speech earlier in the week, I ventured into that intensely political area. I understand why the scientific minds do not go there.
Towards the end, conference participants wondered loudly why there were not more MPs present. One speaker had vigorously recommended a series of ‘entry criteria’ for MPs – IQ testing, personality testing – with a view to raising their game. In fear of failing the minimal threshold, I forbear comment.
The received wisdom was that MPs were absent because they did not care. Not so. They were not there for two reasons.
- They would have needed to have slunk out of select committees with a permission slip from the Whip (as I did through auto-suggestion).
- And they stayed away because many accurately sensed the nature of the news, and the implication that current economic model is at fault, and chose, through short-term electoral interest, not to front up.
Shame ‘bout that. But the people are waking up to this.
Published in Environment & Resource Management by Kennedy Graham on Fri, June 10th, 2011
Tags: Biosphere, climate change
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on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
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It’s a similar,though even far more serious situation to the 1930s and the response to Hitler,Mussolini,Japan too and,indirectly Stalin.Lots of talk but no action.There were a number of reasons why so little was done;all seemed valid to those in power at the time.As Churchill pointed out,WWII “was the unnecessary war”.We are now heading full-steam ahead for a global catastrophy.My own leading indicator is the methane clathrates in the tundras which started to thaw six years ago.I’m in despair:politics–the art of the possible–fails us once more.
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Yea and I hope Sir KG is our next PM
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Good post, Ken.
FWIW, I concur with Valis.
And further, there are people who are obstructing progress in these areas who are deeply enmeshed in MED & Treasury, answering to MNC’s and US corporations, who should be sued for treason due to their total disregard for the well-being of NZ citizens, which should be their paramount concern, not the profits of corporations whose shareholders live in other nations. We can vote out the National MP’s, we can’t do much about the biased and embedded public service advisors.
I’ve already ranted on this topic over on Gareth’s post about the provisions of the Transport Budget, so I won’t repeat the rest of it.
Glad to see that Russ and you have the integrity to look the uncomfortable facts in the eye.
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