What a year 2019 is already proving to be. Last year we had the shocking no nonsense report from the IPCC telling us we have just 12 years in which to prevent the climate crisis reaching a critical tipping point from which recovery might prove impossible.
We have seen Sir David Attenborough’s hard-hitting documentaries and witnessed the massive direct action of Extinction Rebellion, which has succeeded in putting pressure on the government to declare a climate emergency. Although this does not legally compel the government to act.
Finally, we have heard from the amazing young activist from Sweden - Greta Thunberg, who left our politicians in no doubt about just how dire the situation is and powerful their response needs to be.
All of these have one thing in common. They are all levelled at our leaders in the hope that they will finally face up to the seriousness of the situation and start rolling out a series of actions which will support the nation in playing our part in tackling this vast problem.
But, as I have said before, grassroots organisations like ours cannot sit idly by and do nothing while we wait for the leadership we so desperately need. It is our job to do all we can to not only reduce our impacts on the environment but also to help keep the climate crisis right up there on the top of the political agenda.
Make your pledge for a sustainable future
From our many meetings and conversations with the Merton public over the past few years, we have learned that many residents and businesses really want to do their bit to reduce their impact but are not always sure how best to do this.
For this reason Sustainable Merton now feels it is time to develop a handbook of do’s and don'ts of sustainability actions we can all engage in over the coming years.
While taking action to reduce our impact is a personal decision, the best way for this to grow is by all of us sharing our decisions with our family, friends and colleagues. It is important that we try to make this grow as much as possible because little changes we make will only have a big impact when many other people adopt them too.
This is an ambitious undertaking but one we hope that you agree is absolutely necessary. Over the coming weeks, we will be sending out more information about how you can make a pledge to be part of the solution.
Tom Walsh
Community Ambassador, Sustainable Merton
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