WEBVTT

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I've got to start by admitting
that in many ways

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me giving a talk about how climate action
can help Black communities is surprising.

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I grew up poor and Black
with a single mother in Tottenham,

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one of the most deprived areas in London,

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in the 1970s and '80s.

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Climate change was the last
thing on my mind.

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And representing Tottenham as its member
of Parliament for the past 20 years,

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my focus has been on trying to reduce
the deprivation I grew up around.

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In the past, the climate crisis never
featured at the forefront of my politics

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because it was never one
of the most immediate challenges

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my constituents were facing,

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or at least it didn't feel like it.

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Rising sea levels feel unimportant
when your bank balance is falling.

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Global warming is not your concern
when you can't pay the heating bills.

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And you're not thinking about pollution
when you're being stopped by the police.

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And so perhaps this is why

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as the Black Lives Matter movement
roared across the world,

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there's been so little mention
of saving Black lives

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from the climate emergency.

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For too long, those of us
who cared about racial justice

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treated environmental justice
as though it was elitist.

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And at the same time,

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the leaders who did focus
on climate change

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were usually white

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and rarely bothered to enlist the support
of Black voices in their work.

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Even progressive allies
sometimes took our votes for granted

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and assumed that our community didn't care
or wouldn't understand.

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The truth is the opposite is true.

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Black people breathe in the most toxic air
relative to the general population.

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We are more likely to suffer
from respiratory diseases like asthma.

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And it is people of color

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who are more likely to suffer
in the climate crisis.

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This is no coincidence.

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The cheapest housing
tends to be next to the busiest roads,

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and many of the lowest paid jobs
are in the most polluting industries.

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People of color consistently
lie at the bottom of the housing,

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educational and employment ladders.

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This story connects Black
communities across the world,

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from London to Lagos to LA.

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Black Americans are exposed
to 56 percent more pollution

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than they cause.

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White Americans breathe
17 percent less air pollution

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than they produce.

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It gives a whole new meaning
to the Black Lives Matter slogan

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"I can't breathe."

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We all rightly know the name
of George Floyd,

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who was murdered by the police.

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But we should also know the name
of Ella Kissi-Debrah.

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Ella, a nine-year-old
mixed-race girl from South East London,

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was killed by a fatal asthma attack.

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Evidence suggests this was caused

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partly by the unlawful levels
of air pollution near her home.

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And it's not only urban areas

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where Black lives are disproportionately
under threat from climate change.

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My parents' home country of Guyana

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is one of the most vulnerable
countries on Earth

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to the effects of climate change.

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So far, Guyana has contributed
relatively little

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to the climate emergency,

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but it's one of the countries
facing the most serious threats from it.

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While the annual carbon dioxide emissions
per head in the United States

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is a staggering 16.5 metric tons,

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in Guyana it's just 2.6.

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It is a pattern repeated across the globe.

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Those countries that have contributed
least to the climate breakdown,

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mainly in the global south,

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will suffer the most from floods,
droughts, and rising temperatures.

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This is a pattern of suffering
with a long history.

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The exploitation of our planet's
natural resources

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has always been tied
to the exploitation of people of color.

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The logic of colonization

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was to extract valuable resources
from our planet through force,

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paying no attention
to its secondary effects.

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The climate crisis is in a way
colonialism's natural conclusion.

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The solution is to build a new coalition

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made up of all the groups
most affected by this emergency:

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Black people in American cities

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who are already protesting
that they cannot breathe;

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people of color in Guyana
watching sea levels rise

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to the point where many of their homes
become uninhabitable;

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young people in places
like Tottenham, London,

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afraid of the world
that they will grow old in;

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and progressive allies from all nations,

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of all races, religions,
creeds and ages on their side,

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all demanding recognition

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that climate justice is linked
to racial justice, social justice

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and intergenerational justice too.

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And let me say something
about how we build this new movement

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and what it must look like.

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First, we need a recognition

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that the climate movement
is not only about protecting the planet.

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It is primarily about caring
for the people who live on the planet.

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Globally as well as nationally,

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we need to recognize
structural imbalances and inequalities.

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A radical green recovery plan
should provide jobs to the people

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who've been disenfranchised for centuries,

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new jobs planting trees,
insulating buildings

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and working on green technologies.

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We cannot tackle the climate crisis
without addressing racial inequalities.

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And we cannot solve racial inequalities
without fixing the economic system.

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The new deal the economy
needs is not only green,

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it's green and Black.

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Second, we need more Black leaders.

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It cannot be right in 2020

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that almost all the leading climate change
activists we recognize are white.

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At Davos this year,

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five young female members
of the Fridays for Future movement

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came together to give a press conference
at the World Economic Forum.

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This is a picture
the Associated Press put out.

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Here is the original image.

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As the Ugandan activist, Vanessa Nakate,
herself put it afterwards,

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"You didn't just erase a photo,
you erased a continent."

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We need to look at
who is being cropped out

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of leadership positions
in environmental organizations too.

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People of color makeup around 40 percent
of the United States population.

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So why is it a University
of Michigan study

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found that the percentage of minorities
in leadership positions

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in US environmental organizations
is less than 12 percent?

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Global organizations should consider

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moving their headquarters
to the global south

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and urban areas that are most affected
by the climate emergency.

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There should be new scholarships
and bursaries in environmental science

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for people of color.

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Educate yourself.

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Join great movements that recognize
the links between climate and race.

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To name a few,

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the Black Environment Network
and Wretched of the Earth.

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And finally,

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racial injustice and climate injustice
are both rooted in the evil notion

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that some lives
are more important than others.

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If you march to say Black Lives Matter
in Minneapolis, London or Sydney,

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please also march for the Black lives
on the Caribbean island of Haiti

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as its children are displaced by storms.

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Please also march for the Black lives
being lost in Darfur,

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the first climate change conflict.

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And please also march for the Indigenous
people of the Amazon rainforest,

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as Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro
weakens its protections.

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If we are serious about protecting
Black lives in the Global South

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as well as the north,

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we need to strengthen international laws.

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We need a way to apply
international criminal laws,

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like war crimes or crimes
against humanity, to the planet.

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We need a new international law of ecocide

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to criminalize the willful and widespread
destruction of the environment,

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a law that criminalizes the most
severe crimes against nature itself,

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even for acts don't involve
direct human suffering.

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Economics, race and class

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are at the center
of today's political struggles.

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The Black Lives Matter movement
needs to wake up to climate injustices

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just as the climate movement

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must make every effort
to include the reality of people of color.

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Young Black boys growing up
in single-parent households in Tottenham

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won't have the opportunities I had

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in a world ravaged by climate chaos.

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My distant cousins and relatives
growing up in Guyana

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won't have a future if their homes
are drowning under water.

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Now is the time for Black
and climate movements

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to come together unequivocally
and say, "We can't breathe."

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Thank you very much.