Local residents and BCP employees were today welcomed to Bournemouth’s Central Gardens outside the Town Hall by the addition of a Wish Tree, and a small plaque. This tree was planted by members of the local Extinction Rebellion (XR) group to illustrate their dissatisfaction with the council’s lack of progress on the Climate and Ecological Emergency it declared in 2019.
They hope the Wish Tree will encourage BCP residents toexpress their climate wishes. As such there is an open invitation to all residents to ‘post’ their Climate wishes on a piece of paper and append them to the tree. XR also invite members of the Council to come to the tree and see whatpeoples wishes are, in the hope they will take note and take appropriate action.
While expressing concern over the lack of progress from BCP on climate heating issues in general, Adam Osman from XR BCP, expressed particular concern regarding the lack of action in terms of mitigation for the ‘already baked-in’ effects of current and historical emissions that are increasing flood risks from the sea and our rivers. He noted that Baroness Brown, Chair of the Adaptation Committee at the Climate Change Committee (CCC) in a report entitled ‘A lack of leadership is preventing essential investment to prepare the UK for climate change’ said earlier this month:
“Our last major assessment of the UK’s climate risk found that climate impacts have increased in the UK but that actions to prepare us are not keeping pace … adaptation in the UK remains chronically underfunded and overlooked. This must change.” [1].
In the same report Ben Caldecott, from the CCC said:
“The UK faces growing climate impacts and needs to rapidly increase public and private investment in climate resilience. These investments will reduce future economic damage caused by floods and heatwaves, and can enhance growth and improve the sustainability of the public finances over time.” [2].
Tom Lees from XR BCP pointed out that being a coastal conurbation with a number of rivers flowing into it, the Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole area is particularly at risk of flooding. He further states that be visiting the website of Climate Central, an independent group of scientists and communicators who research and report the facts about thechanging climate and how it affects people’s lives, it can be seen that on our current trajectory many parts of BCP will be flooded in the near future [3]. The area’s most at risk are in Christchurch and Poole.
Extinction Rebellion also highlight that residents should be concerned for the economic future of the area as all our beaches, the visiting of which the council bases a large proportion of its current and future income on, are also at riskof being totally lost.
For these reasons XR claim the Council has an obligation to educate residents to flood risks. Greg Lambe, a member of the group commented “not only are BCP woefully lacking progress with any real tangible actions, they are doing nothing to educate BCP residents about what is going to happen to the area due to the increasing, and accelerating, extremes of weather.”
The tree that Extinction Rebellion planted is a Rowan (Sorbus aucuparia) and is indigenous to the UK. It was chosen for a number of reasons including: the leaves provide food for caterpillars of a number of moths, its flowers provide pollen and nectar for bees and other pollinating insects, and the resulting berries are a rich source of autumn and winter food for many bird species.
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