The eclectic and passionate panel, wonderfully chaired by ABC Radio icon Julia Lester, was made of Jasper Lee, representing Electrify Adelaide, Dr Kate Wiley, from Doctors for the Environment, and Luci Tinsley-Smith, a dedicated 15yrs old representative of the Australian Youth Climate Coalition (AYCC) and… Dr Verity Cooper.

We will soon release video excerpts of the Forum. In the meantime… Here are some highlights.

Luci
“As young people, we really care about the environment and want to make change even if we can’t vote yet. We want you to vote for us, the young people, who’ll have to deal with any consequences later. Community is really important, especially if you’re trying to do something about the environment. If you try to do something by yourself, it gets very overwhelming and you don’t have a community all around you.”

Jasper
“The good news is renewables - in particular rooftop solar -  are actually the cheapest for of energy and their costs are going down. We have in front of us the means to achieve electrification for each and everyone of us at home - being to install, consume and store our own energy - especially if it is out of the hands of greedy energy companies. No household should be left behind. A third of Australians are renters and very often cash poor or income earners who can’t afford the process. So we’re keen to see Government and policy makers acting so that no-one is left behind.”

Kate
“We understand we need a healthy planet to have healthy people. We see that climate change is attached to economic problems and therefore political problems but fundamentally for us, it’s a health problem. As GPs, we want people to recognise that climate change is a health issue and as such we need to treat it, like we treat it anything else. That means we acknowledge the cause: our dependency on fossil fuels. As Doctors for the Environment, we advocate for climate solutions such as emission reduction and quit fossil fuels the way we advocate quitting smoking. A treatment plan for Climate Change.”

Having heard from the panel, Julia Lester asked this question to Verity: “You’ve heard from our panelists. If you get voted in on May 3rd, and you’re sitting in the Lower House in our federal parliament, what are going to do about all that?”

Verity
“One: No new coal and gas. Two: Get the fossil fuel corporate donors out of our politicians’ back pockets. A climate trigger, out of every decision made… Tanya Pliberseck didn’t have a leg to stand on and would have been quite rightly sued by the lawyers working for the fossil fuel industry. And then… the EPA was cancelled by the Prime Minister because of pressure from the WA Premier. Let’s be serious!”

“Who would you support as an Independent, sitting on the cross bench?”

Verity
“The beauty of being an Independent is that you can look at the best ideas of whatever party produces for legislation and that is an incredible freedom!  […] You can choose the best ideas! So for the Independents, this is going to be a very important election.”

“The influence of ‘the media’ ”

Verity
“As GPs, Kate and I check our information every single day. We try to check it with different sources. I think that’s what we all need to do. Check your source and cross check them with others.”

To which Julia Lester added… “And you don’t check your sources on Social Media!” 

At the end of the forum, as he thanked the panel, Jean-Marc Spiler - who organised the event - read a few pages from Joelle Gurgis’ Book “Humanity’s Moment”. As a scientist, Joelle was Australia’s key contributor to the IPCC’s Sixth Report:

“Now is not the time to sit on the sidelines. It is the time to take a stand for what you really believe in. It is the moment to step up and do everything you can to influence the outcome of decisions that really matter. In democratic countries at least, our politicians are people we have voted for, people we put in charge of our future. Each of us wields enormous political power in how we vote, where we put our money and what we say and do. Together, we can change governments, demand corporate responsibility and transform our communities one conversation at a time. We can create the change we want to see in the world.”