Environmentalist
. This is a transcript of an interview I did for LBC with Matt Frei, discussing what has been achieved by the Extinction Rebellion protests. ‘ These protests have already achieved something, which is to change the public conversation. They have transformed it. The protests have made a real difference […]
A thing to bear in mind is that climate change is like diabetes. It is a progressive disease if you don’t do something about it, it goes on getting worse. So the later you start doing something about the problem, the worse the eventual outcome will be for you.
What is really significant is what the protests have already accomplished, they have changed the conversation. There is no question about the significance of what they have accomplished by bringing attention to this issue. I think that we have not understood the urgency of the climate problem, and how serious […]
Actually governments know how serious this is, so in a way, you can’t forgive them…By and large the public are very responsive to good leadership from politicians, to having a problem explained to them and having it explained what everyone is going to do. That is not really happening. In […]
Revoke Brexit – that is the single most important thing that a British Government could do to tackle climate change as Brexit is both undermining our ability to make our own low carbon transition but also removes one of the strongest and most influential voices within the EU for higher […]
On March 7th, I spoke at the Belvedere Forum in Warsaw, Poland. I discussed what needs to be done to mobilise the public to support action on climate change, and whether last year’s COP24 in Katowice has kept alive the flame of hope from Paris. . Climate change is a […]
The core argument of this lecture is that failure of climate change policy represents an existential threat to civilisation that will destroy the foundations of trust on which democracy depends. Climate change is a unique problem in human history. Climate policy success demands the local, national and geo-political cooperation that […]
The mid-term elections in the US are widely seen as having been something of a referendum on Trump. If so, despite his protestations to the contrary, he lost. There was much media commentary on election day and immediately after about the non-appearance of the forecast Democratic wave. As is becoming […]
REMARKS BY TOM BURKE CBE TO THE GLOBAL ENGINEERING CONGRESS INSTITUTE OF CIVIL ENGINEERS, LONDON WEDNESDAY 24TH OCTOBER 2018 Thank you for the invitation to speak to you today at such an important and timely event. I am particularly pleased to be asked to speak about financing decarbonisation. When I […]
These are anxious times. Much that we take for granted in the way the world is ordered is in flux. The brief moment when scholars talked confidently of the ‘End of History’ has passed. Change is no longer an option, to be welcomed or resisted, as a matter of […]