To coincide with a similar event in London, today campaigners walked backwards in Albert Square, Manchester, to protest against climate change.
"The world leaders met in Paris on climate change with no compulsion and no framework to keep the temperature rise below 1.5 degrees" explained Judy Paskell, of Campaign Against Climate Change "Not only are Cameron and company not doing enough, they are also going backwards. They have abolished subsidies for onshore wind, almost abolished subsidies for solar panels and abolished the green deal..."
Centre stage at the event was the Boxing Day flood in Salford, when Lower Broughton was almost washed away in a torrent from the River Irwell...
"About a year ago I was involved in some carbon literacy training in Salford to build awareness, and we talked about the probability of floods in Salford was 1 in 100years but that had been increased to 1 in 75 because of climate change" said Pauline Lozoya Hocking of Climate Survivors "And then a few months later the place where we held the flood awareness was flooded.
"It's not enough to have the floods, where everybody rallies around and gets back to normal, with no links being made with the bigger picture and the wider causes" she added "That spirit of co-operation continued despite the odds and that, for me, is the solution. That's what we are in contrast to the profit driven gas, oil and coal industry. That is revolutionary, those neighbours working together."
Pauline gave the example of the Lake District, where everyone rallied round, things got back to normal and then another flood happened...
"We have to look at ways a community can work together for solutions" she explained "It's always `We'll do something in the future about climate change'. It's never now."
Pauline announced plans for a big community event in Albert Park, Lower Broughton on Sunday 5th June called Floods, Climate Change, Solutions, where local residents can work together to find their own answers.*
Meanwhile, Salford resident Alice Searle said she was writing to the new Mayor of Salford with a plan to put solar panels on primary schools as part of an educational project with kids who could monitor the benefits... "It's junior maths, junior science and would pay in the long term" she said "It will cost the Council nothing. Education of the public should start with us talking to children."
A letter was also read out from Salford-based firefighter Simon Hickman of the Fire Brigades Union, who couldn't be at the protest as he was working...
"While the overwhelming scientific evidence is not enough to convince some, our own experience tells the story from the sharp end" he wrote "More and more are firefighters called to extreme weather events, our region being heavily affected in the last year both by flood and moorland fires.
"I have been an operational firefighter for more than 25 years and for the first twenty years I can't recall attending a single incident due to natural flooding from the weather and only the occasional moorland fires" he added "In the last decade these types of incidents have become more prevalent, with no prospect of positive change if we continue on our environmentally destructive path.
"The fire service has no statutory obligation to attend flooding incidents and has only limited training and equipment to deal with these incidents, and no funding whatsoever" he explained "This is a fight we need to take to our employers at local and national level. We routinely put firefighters and the public in harm's way and lack the political will to address climate change. While our political policies seem to act soley in the interest of big business profit we will never solve the climate change issue."
Other speakers linked issues including TTIP and the refugee crisis with climate change, while Martin Porter of Frack Free Greater Manchester explained that the only reason the Paris Agreement is still alive was the death of a right wing Supreme Court judge, Antonin Scalia, who was almost certainly about to strike down President Obama's environmental legislation limiting coal...
"It potentially allowed Obama to appoint a liberal judge and save the Paris Agreement" said Martin "What an unlikely hero Scalia was...for dying... But we're here because we don't want world governments to go backwards on the pledges they made in the Paris Agreement last December, and the front line against climate change in this country is fracking."
He mentioned two events, one on Saturday 21st May, when campaigners will be holding a good natured protest at 9am at the Etihad Stadium to "subvert" the message of fracking company, Ineos, which is sponsoring the Mini Greater Manchester Run – "We're not calling for a boycott of the run, we're calling on the run to boycott Ineos..."
The second protest is on 6th July when there's a huge pro-fracking event at Manchester Conference Centre, costing £450 a ticket... "We'll be outside, giving messages of the alternatives for a cleaner, better world without fracking" he said.
At 3pm today, however, with the bells of Manchester Town Hall ringing, the campaigners walked backwards around Albert Square
"We're walking backwards to symbolise our Government's appalling stance on climate change" said Judy Paskell to the bemused public "Most of them, even the stupidest, agree that climate change is happening...but are they doing anything?...No they are not!"
See the video of the Backwards Walk on the Salford Star YouTube channel – click here
* Floods, Climate Change, Solutions - Sunday 5th June 4pm-6:30pm Alberts of Salford, Albert Park, Lower Broughton. For further details see the Climate Survivors Facebook page or email climatesurvivors@gmail.com
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