Climate justice can't happen without racial justice

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

me giving a talk about how climate action

can help black communities is surprising.

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

one of the most deprived areas in London

in the 1970s and '80s.

Climate change was the
last thing on my mind.

And representing Tottenham
as its member of Parliament

for the past 20 years, my focus
has been on trying to reduce

the deprivation I grew up around.

In the past, the climate
crisis never featured

at the forefront of my politics

because it was never one of
the most immediate challenges

my constituents were facing,

or at least it didn't feel like it.

Rising sea levels feel unimportant

when your bank balance is falling.

Global warming is not your concern

when you can't pay the heating bills.

And you're not thinking about pollution

when you're being stopped by the police.

And so, perhaps this is why,

as the Black Lives Matter
movement roared across the world,

there's been so little
mention of saving black lives

from the climate emergency.

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

treated environmental justice
as though it was elitist.

And at the same time,

the leaders who did
focus on climate change

were usually white and rarely
bothered to enlist the support

of black voices in their work.

Even progressive allies sometimes
took our votes for granted

and assumed that our community didn't care

or wouldn't understand.

The truth is the opposite is true.

Black people breathe in the most toxic air

relative to the general population.

We are more likely to suffer
from respiratory diseases

like asthma.

And it is people of color

who are more likely to
suffer in the climate crisis.

This is no coincidence.

The cheapest housing tends to
be next to the busiest roads

and many of the lowest paid jobs

are in the most polluting industries.

People of color consistently
lie at the bottom

of the housing, educational,
and employment ladders.

This story connects black
communities across the world,

from London to Lagos to LA.

Black Americans are exposed
to 56% more pollution

than they cause.

White Americans breathe
17% less air pollution

than they produce.

It gives a whole new meaning

to the Black Lives Matter
slogan, "I can't breathe."

We all rightly know the
name of George Floyd,

who was murdered by the police.

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

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

was killed by a fatal asthma attack.

Evidence suggests this was caused partly

by the unlawful levels of
air pollution near her home.

And it's not only urban
areas where black lives

are disproportionately under
threat from climate change.

My parents' home country of Guyana

is one of the most
vulnerable countries on Earth

to the effects of climate change.

So far, Guyana has
contributed relatively little

to the climate emergency,
but it's one of the countries

facing the most serious threats from it.

While the annual carbon
dioxide emissions per head

in the United States is a
staggering 16.5 metric tons,

in Guyana it's just 2.6.

It is a pattern repeated across the globe.

Those countries that
have contributed least

to the climate breakdown,
mainly in the global south,

will suffer the most from floods,

droughts, and rising temperatures.

This is a pattern of
suffering with a long history.

The exploitation of our
planet's natural resources

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

The logic of colonization was
to extract valuable resources

from our planet through force,

paying no attention to
its secondary effects.

The climate crisis is, in a way,

colonialism's natural conclusion.

The solution is to build a new coalition

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

black people in American cities

who are already protesting
that they cannot breathe,

people of color in Guyana
watching sea levels rise

to the point where many of their
homes become uninhabitable,

young people in places
like Tottenham, London,

afraid of the world that
they will grow old in,

and progressive allies from all nations,

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

all demanding recognition
that climate justice

is linked to racial
justice, social justice,

and intergenerational justice too.

And let me say something
about how we build

this new movement and
what it must look like.

First, we need a recognition
that the climate movement

is not only about protecting the planet.

It is primarily about caring

for the people who live on the planet.

Globally as well as nationally,

we need to recognize structural
imbalances and inequalities.

A radical green recovery plan

should provide jobs to the people

who've been disenfranchised for centuries,

new jobs planting trees,
insulating buildings,

and working on green technologies.

We cannot tackle the climate crisis

without addressing racial inequalities.

And we cannot solve racial inequalities

without fixing the economic system.

The new deal the economy
needs is not only green,

it's green and black.

Second, we need more black leaders.

It cannot be right in 2020

that almost all the leading
climate change activists

we recognize are white.

At Davos this year, five
young female members

of the Fridays for Future movement

came together to give a press conference

at the World Economic Forum.

This is a picture the
Associated Press put out.

Here is the original image.

As the Ugandan activist Vanessa Nakate

herself put it afterwards,

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

We need to look at who
is being cropped out

of leadership positions in
environmental organizations too.

People of color makeup around 40%

of the United States population.

So, why is it a University
of Michigan study

found that the percentage of minorities

in leadership positions in US
environmental organizations

is less than 12%?

Global organizations should consider

moving their headquarters
to the global south

and urban areas that are most affected

by the climate emergency.

There should be new scholarships

and bursaries in environmental
science for people of color.

Educate yourself.

Join great movements
that recognize the links

between climate and race.

To name a few, the Black
Environment Network

and Wretched of the Earth.

And finally, racial injustice
and climate injustice

are both rooted in the evil notion

that some lives are more
important than others.

If you march to say Black Lives Matter

in Minneapolis, London, or Sydney,

please also march for the black lives

on the Caribbean island of Haiti

as its children are displaced by storms.

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

the first climate change conflict.

And please also march
for the indigenous people

of the Amazon rainforest

as Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro

weakens its protections.

If we are serious about
protecting black lives

in the global south as well as the north,

we need to strengthen international laws.

We need a way to apply
international criminal laws

like war crimes or crimes
against humanity to the planet.

We need a new international law of ecocide

to criminalize the willful

and widespread destruction
of the environment,

a law that criminalizes
the most severe crimes

against nature itself,

even for acts don't involve
direct human suffering.

Economics, race, and class

are at the center of
today's political struggles.

The Black Lives Matter movement

needs to wake up to climate injustices

just as the climate movement
must make every effort

to include the reality of people of color.

Young black boys growing up

in single-parent households in Tottenham

won't have the opportunities I had

in a world ravaged by climate chaos.

My distant cousins and
relatives growing up in Guyana

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

Now is the time for black
and climate movements

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

Thank you very much.