Temperatures and waters are rising. Injustices are rising. We are rising!
*UPDATED 29 NOV
Join us at the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh on 9th December for the COP28 Global Day of Action for Climate Justice! Speakers include Dave Moxham, STUC Deputy General Secretary. Full list via link.
Other updates, including UNISON at COP28, below.
We’ve had the hottest summer on record. Politicians backtracking on climate commitments. Continued corporate profiteering fuelling the climate and cost of living crises. It’s time to take action.
As world leaders gather for the UN’s climate negotiations at COP28 in Dubai, presided over by an oil executive, people are coming together on 9 December around the world to demand climate justice.
In Edinburgh we want to send a strong message to decision makers that we are united for action, to tackle the climate and nature crises, secure sustainable jobs, a fairer, greener, healthier society for everyone in Scotland and justice for those around the world impacted by the climate crisis.
The 28th Conference of Parties (COP) is from Thursday 30 November to Tuesday 12th December, with over 198 countries invited to take part. World leaders will make key decisions on how countries will commit to tackle the climate emergency and deliver on the Paris Agreement.
Once again COP is taking place in a nation notorious for fossil fuel extraction and human rights abuses, making the context of negotiations tense. It will also be taking place just as the UK government seems to be rowing back on its own national, and international, commitments to Net Zero.
Meanwhile, the Scottish Government has delayed its vital new climate plan (which sets out the steps to achieve legally set targets).
UNISON branches are encouraged to support the Edinburgh event, organised by Stop Climate Chaos Scotland and the Climate Justice Coalition. Gather at the Scottish Parliament at 12.30pm on 9 Dec. Full details and info to help promote it are here.
There will be inspiring speakers, the opportunity to send a message to the Scottish party leaders for action on climate and nature in 2024, kids activities, and more!
The STUC, with UNISON and sister trade unions, including international colleagues, were among over 100,000 people who took to the streets of Glasgow in 2021 to tell world leaders at the COP26 climate talks they wanted action on the climate and nature emergencies, highlighting the need for a just transition.
Since then, despite record breaking temperatures and increasingly devastating climate impacts, we have seen a lack of progress on action to reduce emissions, protect nature, or make the biggest polluters pay for the damage they are causing.
You can register here to say you’re coming to the Edinburgh COP28 day of action, and there are links there to share the event on Facebook and Twitter/X and Instagram.
Separately, the Climate Justice Coalition trade union caucus is holding a key low cost event in London on Sunday 28 January, called We Make Tomorrow. It is supported by UNISON and is aimed at building worker’s power on climate and crisis. You can register via the link.
UNISON will be at COP28 representing the ITUC.
This ITUC statement calls for a labour intensive Just Transition work programme. (see below too)
Further related info, from UNISON UK’s Green Network:
Read: Amnesty International call to COP28 linking Fossil Fuels to global human rights abuses
“COP28 is the time for states to agree to move beyond the fossil fuel era and leave behind its shameful record of climate damage and human rights abuses.”
- Candy Ofime, Amnesty International’s Legal Advisor on Climate Justice
ITUC demands for a just transition to Net Zero
The ITUC supports the ILO guidelines for the implementation of a just transition, including the policies and measures needed to create a normative framework for a just transition – inclusive of all its elements. Building on this the global labour movement is proposing the following definition of a Just Transition that could be used to guide the work at the UNFCC:
- A just transition secures the future and livelihoods of workers and their communities during the transition to a low-carbon economy effectively limiting global temperature rises to 1.5C above pre-industrial levels.
- Just Transition plans should be co-created with workers and their trade unions to provide and guarantee decent work, social protection, training opportunities and job security for all workers affected by global warming and climate change policies.
- Plans must be underpinned by the fundamental Labour rights of freedom of association and collective bargaining and facilitated through social dialogue between workers and their unions, employers and governments as established by the ILO.
A just transition requires guarantees for intergenerational and gender equity, racial justice, respect for the rights of indigenous peoples, impacted communities and migrants and promotes and protects human rights and ILO fundamental labour rights.
See: COP28: Trade unions demand a labour inclusive Just Transition work programme.