Delegates arriving in Glasgow for COP26 this week complained of chaotic scenes - left queuing in the cold for hours, with no protection from the elements. Rewind eight months, and queues in Scotland’s second largest city also made the headlines: a viral photo showed 200 people waiting for a soup kitchen in snow and subzero temperatures.
At Taxpayers Against Poverty we are campaigning for a future where the queues we witnessed in February are a thing of the past. But the climate crisis means that future is under threat. Those standing in line for food are likely to be the least responsible for carbon emissions, but they will be disproportionately affected.
A study by Oxfam found the richest 1 percent of the world’s population produce twice as much carbon as the poorest 50 percent. It’s not hard to see why - in the UK 70 percent of flights are made by a wealthy 15 percent of the population. Over half (57 percent) don’t fly abroad at all. The report concluded that “the over-consumption of a wealthy minority is fuelling the climate crisis, yet it is poor communities paying the price”.
Covid showed us that where we work is an important determinant of our exposure to risk, and the same is true for the effects of climate breakdown. It's easier to avoid exposure to high temperatures or extreme weather when you work in an office. And that exposure continues in the home - those on lower incomes are more likely to live in crowded accommodation prone to overheating.
Poorer communities are also concentrated in urban areas - such as in Haringey, where our founder Rev. Paul Nicolson lived - where temperatures run even higher due to the Urban Heat Island effect.
While the wealthiest can buy air con in the summer and turn up the heating in the winter, the three million in the UK already experiencing fuel poverty do not have that luxury. Housing charity Shelter has found that over a quarter of renters already live in homes they cannot adequately heat.
The effects of extreme weather are even more pronounced for those without a home. In the year before the pandemic, an estimated 144 people died while sleeping rough in London. That’s a figure that will only increase if we do not take action: climatologists predict extremely cold winters will be on the increase.
What are we asking of our leaders as they meet this week? Firstly, we need to bring people who are experiencing poverty to the table. Our leaders are overwhelmingly white, able-bodied and male - we all need to have a voice if we are to overcome the greatest threat humanity has ever faced.
Secondly, those with the broadest shoulders should contribute the most - the principle on which Taxpayers Against Poverty was founded. We cannot expect households already struggling to make ends meet to pay extra on their fuel bills to subsidise green energy.
Thirdly, we need to reduce the vulnerability of those experiencing poverty to climate breakdown. This means ensuring that everyone has access to decent, well-insulated housing.
We know that the transition to a low-carbon economy will involve changes to the job market - but we have been made all too aware during the pandemic that our welfare system is not fit for purpose for those out of work. That is why we are calling for a minimum income standard, below which no-one in or out of work is allowed to fall.
Calculated by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, it is set at what the public consider to be enough for a socially acceptable standard of living. The recent energy bills crisis has shown a frightening hint of what is to come as the climate emergency takes hold - a minimum income standard would change as costs do, paid for by a tax on the very wealthiest in our society.
Climate breakdown will affect everyone, but not everyone will be equally affected. We need our leaders to act now to ensure that both unchecked carbon emissions and queues for soup kitchens become a thing of the past.
