The Guardian
Farmers prosecuted for land clearing allege former NSW minister gave them green light
Landowners found guilty of illegal clearing say Kevin Humphries assured them native vegetation laws were being scrapped
• Stripped bare: Australia’s hidden climate crisis
• Australia spends billions planting trees – then wipes out carbon gains by bulldozing them
A former minister in the Berejiklian government is alleged to have told farmers in his north-west rural New South Wales seat that they could clear native vegetation with impunity because the government was planning to change the law and they would not be prosecuted.
At least that is the message farmers say they took away from numerous meetings and conversations with the former member for Barwon, Kevin Humphries.
Continue reading...'It has been polarising': tube protest divides Extinction Rebellion
Disrupting London trains was opposed by 72% of activists in poll, but has boosted coverage
The climate protests during which one activist was dragged from the roof of a London Underground train by angry commuters had been discussed within Extinction Rebellion [XR] for weeks.
But it was not until Wednesday morning, when a note was posted on the group’s website, that a decision appeared to have been taken.
Continue reading...Fight against Heathrow expansion on verge of victory, says McDonnell
Shadow chancellor says third runway ‘cannot stand’ as court of appeal challenges begin
The campaign against the multibillion-pound expansion of Heathrow is on the verge of victory, John McDonnell has claimed, as three court of appeal judges considered fresh legal challenges against a third runway.
The shadow chancellor, who has long been an opponent of expanding the airport in his constituency, said the picture had changed since the previous legal challenge in the spring, as the UK had legislated for a net-zero emissions target by 2050 and declared a climate emergency.
Continue reading...'There are no excuses left': why climate science deniers are running out of rope
Guardian environment correspondent Fiona Harvey recalls being heckled at the House of Commons and explains how attitudes to climate have shifted in 10 years
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The shouted words rang out across the packed parliamentary corridor: “Fiona Harvey is the worst journalist there is. She’s the worst journalist of them all, because she should know better.”
They were the words of Lord Lawson, former UK chancellor of the exchequer, turned climate denier and now Brexiter, addressing a crowd of more than 100 people trying to cram into a House of Commons hearing on climate change. As listeners craned their necks to hear better, whispering and nudging, he elaborated at length on my insistence on reporting the work of the 97% of the world’s climate scientists whose work shows human responsibility for global heating, and failure to give equal weight to the tiny number of dissenters.
Continue reading...How Guardian editors are making the climate emergency a focus
Guardian editors from across the organisation explain how they are putting the climate emergency front and centre
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The climate crisis is a story that reaches every corner of the world and on the international news desk our team of correspondents report on it from around the globe.
Continue reading...Protesters dragged off tube train as Extinction Rebellion delay commuters in London – video
Extinction Rebellion protesters were dragged off a Jubilee line train in Canning Town, east London, after they delayed morning commuters by clambering on top of the roof some people set upon the activist who had to be defended by London Underground staff
Activist disrupted train commuters in at least two other locations in London on Thursday 17 October
Continue reading...Extinction Rebellion activists disrupt London Underground
Police attend incidents at Shadwell, Stratford and Canning Town during morning rush hour
Activists from Extinction Rebellion have targeted rail and underground services in east London, with pictures on social media showing protesters on top of trains during the morning rush hour.
British Transport Police said they had responded to incidents at Shadwell, Stratford and Canning Town, near the Canary Wharf financial district, on Thursday.
Continue reading...Heathrow expansion violates climate rights of children, say lawyers
Appeal court to hear fresh challenge against plans for construction of third runway
The multibillion-pound expansion of Heathrow violates the rights of children and future generations, who will face the greatest impact of the climate crisis, lawyers will argue at the court of appeal in London.
Fresh legal challenges on Thursday by environmental NGOs, councils and the mayor of London against the construction of a third runway will be presented during a five-day hearing.
Continue reading...Flying foxes found dead and emaciated across eastern Australia as dry weather bites
Vets say conditions have led to a ‘starvation event’, killing creatures or leaving them ‘looking like they’ve been mummified’
Flying foxes, including threatened species, have been dying or taken into care in large numbers due to a food shortage in their habitat in eastern Australia.
Authorities in Queensland and New South Wales say there have been increased reports since September of sick and dead flying-foxes in an area stretching from northern NSW up to Gladstone in Queensland.
Continue reading...Leading car in World Solar Challenge bursts into flames
NunaX car of Dutch team catches fire 250km before finish of 3,000km Darwin to Adelaide race
The leading car in the World Solar Challenge has caught fire and withdrawn from the race a little more than 250km from the Adelaide finish.
The NunaX car of Dutch team Vattenfall caught fire just before Mambray Creek on Thursday.
Continue reading...Footage shows world's fastest ants at top speed – video
New video footage reveals the world's fastest ants galloping across the scorching sand of the Sahara at speeds approaching one metre per second, which is the equivalent of a house cat tearing about at 120mph.
Researchers have found that at full pelt the Saharan silver ants can travel 108 times their body length per second in gallops that brought all six legs off the ground at once
Continue reading...Democrat calls on Google to stop funding climate crisis deniers
Kathy Castor’s letter to Sundar Pichai says it’s hard to ‘overstate the detrimental impact’ groups have had on the climate debate
A Democratic lawmaker has called on Google CEO Sundar Pichai to stop investing in organizations that deny the existence of the climate crisis, saying it was hard to overstate how detrimental the impact of such groups had been on the US climate debate.
Kathy Castor’s letter to Pichai followed a report in the Guardian last week that revealed Google had made “substantial” contributions to some of the most notorious climate deniers in Washington, despite the internet giant’s insistence it supports political action to combat the crisis.
Continue reading...Australia spends billions planting trees – then wipes out carbon gains by bulldozing them
Little more than two years of land clearing will cancel out the $1.5bn in taxpayer funds that goes towards protecting native habitat
Since 2015 the Australian government has committed more than $1.5bn of taxpayer funds to climate change projects that plant or protect native habitat. Over a slightly longer period it has also spent nearly $62m on a policy to plant 20 million trees promised under Tony Abbott.
At the same time the country has significantly stepped up land-clearing programs in several states, bulldozing hundreds of thousands of hectares of forests, mostly for agriculture.
Continue reading...Stripped bare: Australia's hidden climate crisis
An epidemic of land clearing is sabotaging efforts to address climate change. Farming communities are bitterly divided over the issue – but it also has global consequences.
Continue reading...Sawfish numbers in global stronghold are dropping, prompting calls for fishing protection
Monitoring trip returns from ‘stronghold’ for species without finding a single sawfish
Numbers of endangered sawfish in one of their most globally important strongholds are dropping, with conservationists calling for a rules that will cut the numbers of animals being caught in commercial fishing nets in north Queensland.
In September, a two-week private expedition to monitor and tag sawfish in the Norman River, Queensland, returned without finding a single sawfish.
Continue reading...Martin Forwood obituary
Anti-nuclear campaigner who targeted the Sellafield complex in Cumbria and became a respected expert on the industry
For 30 years Martin Forwood, who has died of cancer aged 79, was a thorn in the side of the huge Sellafield nuclear complex in Cumbria. With his unrivalled collection of original documents on the nuclear industry he was a more reliable source of information to journalists and campaigners than the government-owned industry British Nuclear Fuels, or anyone in Whitehall.
But Martin was not just an armchair campaigner; he went in for many imaginative direct actions, including, in 2003, chaining himself to a railway line to halt a nuclear waste shipment from Italy destined for Sellafield. When he came up in court charged with a Victorian-era offence of obstructing the railway, which carried a potential sentence of life imprisonment, the judge acknowledged his sincerity, reduced the charge and fined him.
Continue reading...George Monbiot arrested for defying climate protest ban – video
The Guardian columnist and environmental activist George Monbiot was arrested on Wednesday for defying a London-wide police ban on Extinction Rebellion protests
- Today, I aim to get arrested. It is the only real power climate protesters have | George Monbiot
- Extinction Rebellion lawyers apply for judicial review over protest ban
Meet Pete, the world’s first selfie-taking plant
Name: Pete.
Occupation: Plant.
Continue reading...Ivory Coast law could see chocolate industry ‘wipe out’ protected forests
Critics condemn move placing thousands of square miles of rainforest under control of international companies
The Ivory Coast’s dwindling rainforests could be “wiped out” under a new law that will see legal protections removed from thousands of square miles of classified forest and unprecedented power handed to industrial chocolate manufacturers.
Civil society groups, environmental campaigners and workers’ cooperatives have warned that the new forestry code, ratified by the National Assembly and currently being implemented, will encourage unsustainable cocoa production and legalise large-scale deforestation in already ravaged areas.
Continue reading...Extinction Rebellion lawyers apply for judicial review over protest ban
Request for expedited hearing comes after Metropolitan police impose section 14 order
Lawyers for Extinction Rebellion have filed an urgent application for a judicial review hearing at the high court in London, as the number of arrests in 10 days of demonstrations rose to 1,642 with 133 charged.
The request was filed at the royal courts of justice on the Strand just after 10am on Wednesday. It comes after the Metropolitan police imposed a section 14 order on Monday night, in effect banning all protest by XR in the capital.
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