As the UN Climate Conference continues, thousands will take to the streets in Glasgow today, alongside millions more in other towns and cities across the world, in a Global Day of Action against climate change.
In Glasgow, a crowd will march to the city for a rally in the afternoon where teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg address tens of thousands of climate campaigners as the city hosts the COP26 summit.
Marking the middle weekend of the two-week international climate conference, those taking part in the march and rally – including local community groups, national trade unions and international climate and environment organisations – are expected to travel towards Glasgow Green.
Dozens of roads across the city centre will be closed from the early morning, with between 50,000 to 100,000 people expected to be in attendance.
Representatives of the Stop Cambo campaign – who are calling for an end to the proposed new oil field west of Shetland, thought to contain 800 million barrels of oil – are also believed to address protesters.
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Police have warned they will deal “swiftly and robustly” with any violent disorder or damage to property during planned COP26 protests in Glasgow.
Police Scotland assistant chief constable Gary Ritchie said officers have engaged with key campaign groups to ensure the protests can take place safety, but they will quickly crack down on any problems if need be.
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The Glasgow events are a few of 250 simultaneous actions planned by march organisers across the world.
Elsewhere in the UK, protests include a march from the Bank of England to Trafalgar Square in London.
The protests come at the end of the first week of the conference, where countries are under pressure to increase ambition on cutting greenhouse gas emissions and to ensure finance for poor countries to tackle the crisis.
Earlier in the week, world leaders gathered in Glasgow to unite around pledges to try to limit global warming to 1.5C.
Highlights from COP26 so far
• US and Canada are among 20 nations to agree to stop fossil fuel financing by the end of 2022
• At least 23 nations say they will phase out coal power in 2030s or 2040s depending on size, including Indonesia, Vietnam, Poland, and Ukraine
• The UK will force financial firms and major businesses to publish plans about how they will get to net zero
• Rishi Sunak also announced firms controlling 40% of global assets totalling $130 trillion will align with the Paris Agreement
• At least 110 countries representing 85% of the world’s forests agreed to end and reverse deforestation by 2030.
• South Africa, the most coal-intensive economy in the G20, will get $8.5bn to help decarbonise from the UK the EU, the US, France and Germany, in an innovative partnership that shows how side deals agreed outside of the traditional UN process can help close the emissions gap.
• Scores of world leaders signed a pledge to slash potent climate heating gas methane by 30% by 2030, a gas that could significantly help slow short term warming
• Japan committed an extra $10bn in climate finance over five years
• Over 40 world leaders back plan to fund clean technology around the world by 2030, the UK government announced
• India finally came forward with a net zero promise – the 2070 target is 20 years later than the key 2050 date but still a big step forward, especially with its commitment to significantly slash emissions by 2030
• Five countries, including Britain and the United States, and a group of global charities promised $1.7bn to support indigenous people’s conservation of forests and strengthen their land rights
On Friday, the Glasgow summit discussed youth and public empowerment and Ms Thunberg was among thousands of protesters on a march.
Many of those in attendance were young people who took part in a rally in George Square on COP26’s Youth Day.
Prince Charles turned down an invite to join the rally, saying that taking part would be “difficult”.
But, the next in line to the throne said he sympathised with the “frustration” of the younger generation in a speech to COP26 negotiators, telling them the “weight of history” is resting on their shoulders.
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25:16
The Daily Climate Show
Speaking at the Fridays for Future rally in Glasgow, Ms Thunberg insisted that COP26 is already a “failure.”
She said: “It should be obvious that we cannot solve a crisis with the same methods that got us into it in the first place.
“Many are starting to ask themselves: ‘What will it take for the people in power to wake up?’
“But let’s be clear, they are already awake. They know exactly what they are doing.”
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Vanessa Nakate: ‘We’re in a disaster that’s happening every day’
She added that world powers are not doing “nothing”, but “actively creating loopholes and shaping frameworks to benefit themselves and to continue profiting”.
Ms Thunberg continued: “This is an active choice.”
The Swedish activist said COP26 has turned into a “PR event where leaders are giving beautiful speeches and announcing fancy commitments and targets”, adding: “While behind the curtains the governments of the global north countries are still refusing to take any drastic climate action.
“It seems like their main goal is to continue to fight for the status quo.”
Ms Thunberg is expected to give another speech on Saturday.
Saturday’s COP26 theme will be nature – underlying the importance of the natural world and sustainable land use.
The defence secretary has said he is “angry inside” over the infected blood scandal ahead of a long-waited report into the decades-long injustice.
Grant Shapps told Sky News he agreed it had been one of the most “shameful failures” of government and said he was dismayed by the “lack of anybody taking responsibility”.
The findings of a public inquiry into the scandal, chaired by Sir Brian Langstaff, are due to be published on Monday.
From 1970 to the 1990s, tens of thousands of people were infected with contaminated blood through blood products or blood transfusions given via the NHS. People were infected with hepatitis or HIV – in some cases with both.
Mr Shapps told Sunday Morning with Trevor Phillips that the scandal was a “massive injustice which needs to be put right” and said the government would act on the report.
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13:43
Thousands of people died after being given infected blood
He said that while he was yet to see the report, he hoped it would finally allow families’ pain and loss to be acknowledged and for the government to properly respond.
Mr Shapps said he had spoken to relatives of several victims, including a couple who had lost their son, and said their stories made feel him “angry inside”.
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He added: “It just made me angry to know they had lost their son without anyone ever taking responsibility, so I think this is why this report tomorrow is very important.”
Successive governments have been blamed for failing to take responsibility and the current government has been accused of trying to delay compensation to victims after an inquiry was first set up by Theresa May in 2017.
It is estimated that the compensation bill could now exceed £10m.
The defence secretary admitted the process of delivering payouts to victims had gone on for “so long”.
He added: “This is a massive injustice which needs to be put right.
“And I know the government said we will. The report tomorrow, I think, will be the day for that family and others and I know the government will want to respond quickly.”
Asked whether Prime Minister Rishi Sunak would apologise to the victims, Mr Shapps said: “I don’t want to mislead because I don’t have special insight into that.”
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Billionaire Sir Jim Ratcliffe has told Sky News that Britain is ready for a change of government after scolding the Conservatives over their handling of the economy and immigration after Brexit.
While insisting his petrochemicals conglomerate INEOS is apolitical, Sir Jim backed Brexit and spent last weekend with Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer at Manchester United – the football club he now runs as minority owner.
“I’m sure Keir will do a very good job at running the country – I have no questions about that,” Sir Jim said in an exclusive interview.
“There’s no question that the Conservatives have had a good run,” he added. “I think most of the country probably feels it’s time for a change. And I sort of get that, really.”
Sir Jim was a prominent backer of leaving the European Union in the 2016 referendum but now has issues with how Brexit was delivered by Tory prime ministers.
“Brexit sort of unfortunately didn’t turn out as people anticipated because… Brexit was largely about immigration,” Sir Jim said.
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“That was the biggest component of that vote. People were getting fed up with the influx of the city of Southampton coming in every year. I think last year it was two times Southampton.
“I mean, no small island like the UK could cope with vast numbers of people coming into the UK.
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“I mean, it just overburdens the National Health Service, the traffic service, the police, everybody.
“The country was designed for 55 or 60 million people and we’ve got 70 million people and all the services break down as a consequence.
“That’s what Brexit was all about and nobody’s implemented that. They just keep talking about it. But nothing’s been done, which is why I think we’ll finish up with the change of government.”
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has indicated an election is due this year but Monaco-based Sir Jim is unimpressed by the Conservatives’ handling of the economy.
“The UK does need to get a bit sharper on the business front,” he said. “I think the biggest objective for the government is to create growth in the economy.
“There’s two parts of the economy, there’s the services side of the economy and there’s the manufacturing side. And the manufacturing, unfortunately, has been sliding away now for the last 25 years.
“We were very similar in scale to Germany probably 25 years ago.
“But today we’re just a fraction of where Germany is and I think that isn’t healthy for the British economy… particularly when you think the north of England is very manufacturing based, and that talks to things like energy competitiveness, it talks to things like, why do you put an immensely high tax on the North Sea?
“That just disincentivises people from finding hydrocarbons in the North Sea, in energy.
“And what we need is competitive energy. So I mean, in America, in the energy world, in the oil and gas world, they just apply a corporation tax to the oil and gas companies, which is about 30%. And in the UK we’ve got this tax of 75% because we want to kill off the oil and gas companies.
“But if we don’t have competitive energy, we’re not going to have a healthy manufacturing industry. And that just makes no sense to me at all. No.”
‘We’re apolitical’
Asked about INEOS donating to Labour, Sir Jim replied: “We’re apolitical, INEOS.
“We just want a successful manufacturing sector in the UK and we’ve talked to the government about that. It’s pretty clear about our views.”
Sir Jim was keener to talk about the economy and politics than his role at struggling Manchester United, which he bought a 27.7% stake in from the American Glazer family in February – giving him an even higher business profile.
Push for stadium of the North
He is continuing to push for public funds to regenerate Old Trafford and the surrounding areas despite no apparent political support being forthcoming. Sir Keir was hosted at the stadium for a Premier League match last weekend just as heavy rain exposed the fragility of the ageing venue.
“There’s a very good case, in my view, for having a stadium of the North, which would serve the northern part of the country in that arena of football,” Sir Jim said. “If you look at the number of Champions League the North West has won, it’s 10. London has won two.
“And yet everybody from the North has to get down to London to watch a big football match. And there should be one [a large stadium] in the North, in my view.
“But it’s also important for the southern side of Manchester, you know, to regenerate.
“It’s the sort of second capital of the country where the Industrial Revolution began.
“But if you have a regeneration project, you need a nucleus or a regeneration project and having that world-class stadium there, I think would provide the impetus to regenerate that region.”