Martyn Gower, Green Party Candidate for Melton East I joined the Green Party to help put pressure on councils and government to finally take action to solve the ‘Climate Emergency’.

Full statement

We are getting used to politicians making apparently firm statements about the need to tackle this urgently but their slowness to act is all too familiar.
Bill Gates, the Microsoft Entrepreneur, wrote recently, “To stop global warming and avoid the worst effects of climate change, humans need to stop adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere”.
A simple truth, but how does this relate to a local election in Melton Mowbray?
Of course, county councils have responsibility for all areas of local governance climate change will needs to be tackled, beginning with local life.

• All new housing should be built to minimise emissions and planning permission should depend on this, starting now.
• Melton’s public transport system can be coordinated to enable greater public use and greater efficiency, with the benefit of reducing traffic congestion and emissions;
• Local environments can be improved to protect homes and businesses from flooding and to improve the quality of life of the town’s residents;
• Young people can be engaged to promote positive attitudes to the challenges ahead.
We will encourage them to get involved in local politics.
• Where the Green Party controls local councils, such as Brighton, Climate Assemblies have been set up to engage local residents. A carbon reduction fund has been established, a new city park has been created and roads by schools have been closed where possible;
• As new technologies become available, which they will, the County Council must be ready to facilitate their use; one of the largest proportions of emissions of greenhouse gases that cause climate change is cement and steel production and as low carbon alternatives are developed, they must be embraced.
Throughout the Pandemic we have been told that we are ‘following the science’. We have to do the same with climate change, which has the potential to kill many more and devastate large areas of the planet. We all need the Green Party to use its influence to affect policy-making in all areas of government and starting locally is fundamental to this. The Green Party is the only party dedicated to tackling the climate emergency so please VOTE GREEN ON MAY 6TH.