Climate inspiration - film and @SCCScot online debate, as UK CCC calls for strong action

UNISON and Global Justice Now are holding a free community screening of the climate film This Changes Everything next month.

And the union is supporting Stop Climate Chaos Scotland’s Climate Day #AskClimateQ Holyrood election online evening debate on 18 April, as well as holding a joint fringe with SCCS at the STUC Congress in Dundee that lunchtime.

Yesterday the UK Committee on Climate Change said that climate change action in Scotland needs to be stepped up.

As a member of Stop Climate Chaos Scotland (SCCS), we welcome the Committee’s call for strong action and new policies to meet the country’s tough greenhouse emissions reduction targets.

As SCCS said, there is a massive opportunity to not only cut emissions but also to deliver new jobs in sectors like home insulation and renewable energy across Scotland, to improve public health, create investment in new industry and help tackle fuel poverty.

Increasing evidence from around the world shows the growing extent of climate change, with the Guardian reporting yesterday, using a dramatic graphic, that 'record-breaking temperatures have robbed the Arctic of its winter'.

Inspired by the Naomi Klein bestselling book of the same name, the film This Changes Everything asks: "What if confronting the climate crisis is the best chance we’ll ever get to build a better world?”

Join us from 5.30pm for the 6pm prompt screening on Friday 8 April at UNISON Scotland, 14 West Campbell Street, Glasgow G2 6RX. All welcome. Hosted by our International Committee and Green Network, working with Global Justice Now.

There will be a short discussion afterwards, finishing at 8pm. Soft drinks and popcorn too!

And don't forget Earth Hour on Saturday! Sat 19 March. 8.30pm Switch off for your planet!

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#AskClimateQ online debate #Holyrood2016 18 April

Ask the climate question - Stop Climate Chaos Scotland's online debate with political parties

Monday 18th April 2016, 7pm – 8.30pm

With elections in Scotland this May, use your voice to call on political parties to turn climate ambition into climate action. 

Join us online from anywhere in Scotland on Monday 18th April at 7pm.

For many years now, all parties in the Scottish Parliament have been broadly supportive of action on climate change.  In 2009, this was set down in law, in the form of the Scottish Climate Change Act, one of the first climate acts in the world.

At the UN climate talks in Paris at the end of last year, world leaders agreed to take more significant and more urgent action on climate change.  Political decisions made here in Scotland over the next five years will be critical to meeting our climate act, fulfilling our global commitments, and securing the benefits of becoming a low carbon country.

To give climate change the space and priority it deserves on the election agenda, Stop Climate Chaos Scotland is organising a national online debate – and we want you to take part!  

This will be your opportunity to engage with and ask questions of Scotland’s political parties from wherever you are, in a live online broadcast on Monday 18 April, at 7pm. 

Speakers include:

• Sarah Boyack, Environmental  Justice Spokesperson for Scottish Labour Party
• Mark Ruskell, Environment Spokesperson for Scottish Green Party
• SNP speaker TBC
• Liberal Democrats speaker TBC
• Scottish Conservative speaker TBC

More details about this event, including step-by-step instructions about how you can participate, will be published here on the SCCS website in due course.

SCCS' election campaign is directed towards the five political parties currently represented in the Scottish Parliament.

Follow the conversation on Twitter @SCCScot and using #AskClimateQ on the night

• Join the Facebook event 
• Read our supporter briefing to help you talk to your election candidates about climate change and related issues.
• Write to political party leaders today calling for more climate action.