Download Background papers

AGM 08/16
Background
Papers
for the
2016
Motions
1
Motion 1
AGM 08/16
FROM THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
Two years ago a Constitutional amendment was
approved adding a Dissolution clause to the General
Assembly Constitution. In the background paper it
was explained that no discussion had been had at the
Executive Committee (EC) about changing the
General Assembly’s legal form, however, the EC did
intend to review the issue as a new a form for
charities as been introduced called the Charitable
Incorporated Organisation (CIO).
A CIO is:
•
•
•
•
an incorporated form of charity which is not a
company
only has to register with the Charity Commission
and not Companies House
is only created once it is registered by the
Commission
can enter into contracts in its own right and its
trustees will normally have limited or no liability
for the debts of the CIO
The CIO was created in response to requests from
charities for a new structure which could provide some
of the benefits of being a company, but without some
of the burdens.
The CIO structure has several benefits over
unincorporated structures, such as the members and
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trustees are usually personally safeguarded from the
financial liabilities the charity incurs, which is not
normally the case for unincorporated charities and the
charity has a legal personality of its own, enabling it to
conduct business in its own name, rather than the
name of the trustees.
The Charity Commission believes that the CIO will be
most suitable for small to medium sized organisations
which employ staff and/or enter into contracts.
Although establishing and running a CIO should be
simpler than establishing a charitable company, it will
not be as straightforward as running an
unincorporated association or a charitable trust. A CIO
will have to have a registered principal office situated
in either England or Wales and all CIOs will have to
submit an annual return and accounts to the Charity
Commission, regardless of the income of the CIO.
This represents no change for the General Assembly.
CIOs will have to keep a register of members and a
register of trustees which anyone can ask to see, or
be provided with a copy of, the register of trustees.
The constitution of a CIO must contain certain
provisions and the Charity Commission have
produced two model forms of constitution for use by a
CIO; one for CIOs where the members are not
necessarily trustees (the association model) –
relevant to the General Assembly - and one for CIOs
where the only members are the trustees (the
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foundation model). Amendments to a CIO’s
constitution will not be valid until they have been
registered with the Charity Commission as certain
amendments will need their prior consent. Insolvency
law applies to CIOs.
The matter has been referred to the Constitution
Review Group who agree in principle that there are
benefits to conversion. Before proceeding and
incurring the time and expense involved in conversion,
the Executive Committee is seeking the approval of
the General Assembly to bring forward proposals.
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Motion 2
AGM 08/16
FROM THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
Last year a Constitution Review Group was
established by the Executive Committee and in
November 2015 proposals were presented on a
number of issues requiring amendments to the
General Assembly Constitution which are presented
to the Annual Meetings in the name of the Executive
Committee.
Recommendation 1
As the transitional period has now passed paragraph
6A should be removed as it is redundant.
Recommendation 2
Recommendation 1 would entail the deletion of the
final sentence “Members may only serve for a
maximum of two successive terms.” It is considered
that this should be retained as this sets a limit on
length of membership in line with good governance
practice and is now to be included in Paragraph 6.
The definition of “term of office” was reviewed. This is
not specified in the Constitution and has been
interpreted to include a period of co-option of any
length as well as the standard period of four years
following election. Paragraph 7. E. ii gives the
Executive Committee the power to co-opt to any
unfilled vacancies following an election. Paragraph 13.
gives them the power to appoint to any casual
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vacancy that may arise. Those appointed shall serve
until the next election.
The result is that if someone is co-opted, their period
of co-option (which will, of course, be less than two
years, as elections are held every two years) will
count as a “term of office” and therefore, even if they
are subsequently elected for a four year term their
total term of membership could be limited to five or six
years not eight.
The implications of excluding any period of
appointment (described as co-option) from the
definition of “two successive terms” was reviewed and
it was concluded that it should be retained and made
explicit in the Constitution. This will prevent a two year
co-opted term followed by two four year elected terms
resulting in ten years in office. On balance a healthy
turnover of members is beneficial.
Recommendation 3
There is no explicit rule on how long former Executive
Committee should wait before seeking re-election or
indeed be appointed to a vacancy, only that they
cannot serve more than two successive terms. Good
practice would specify that there needs to be a break
usually of at least a year.
Recommendation 4
The possibility of successive co-option has been
raised and this recommendation will prohibit this until
a period of one year has elapsed.
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Recommendation 5
This corrects a typographical error in paragraph 14
which was in the original Constitution (AGM 12/08).
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Motion 3
FROM THE FOY SOCIETY
This motion has been proposed by The Foy Society in
conjunction with the Penal Affairs Panel.
Most people will recognise that powers of surveillance
given to the security services play an important role in
detecting and preventing serious crime. However,
there is a lot of evidence that the current framework
fails to provide adequate safeguards to ensure that it
is conducted in a necessary, proportionate and
accountable way. Examples include police
accessing of journalists’ phone records, GCHQ
alleged spying on a torture victim and MI6
complicity in his kidnap to Gaddafi’s Libya,
unlawful interception of communications, police
infiltration of social and environmental justice
groups; and the revelations of Edward Snowden
about covert surveillance. The development of the
internet and electronic communications where ever
greater amounts of our lives are stored, shared and
sent online, enabling a detailed and intimate picture of
us to be pieced together, has overtaken existing
controls.
The Government’s draft Investigatory Powers Bill
sets out to establish a statutory framework to oversee
and monitor the work of the security services and, as
such, is welcome. Indeed, it is a once in a generation
opportunity to shape our laws for the better, striking
the right balance between the need to keep us all safe
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and the right of citizens to have their legitimate privacy
respected and protected.
The problem, which this motion sets out to
highlight, is that the Investigatory Powers Bill, as
presently drafted, fails to provide adequate
safeguards to protect the privacy of law abiding
citizens. The motion recommends the eight point plan
proposed by Liberty which urges the Government to
amend the Bill in particular as follows:
a)All surveillance requests should be authorised
by a judge.
The Bill provides for a degree of judicial review
but not for prior authorisation. All surveillance
requests (including interception, acquisition of
communications data, use of Covert Human
Intelligence Sources etc.) must be subject to prior
judicial authorisation. There is growing consensus
on this, including former heads of MI5, GCHQ,
Association of Chief Police Officers, the former
Met police director of intelligence, the
Government’s reviewer of terror legislation as well
as parliamentarians across the political spectrum.
A huge number of democratic countries make use
of judges in signing off surveillance – including all
the other countries involved in the Five Eyes
Alliance; USA, Australia, Canada and New
Zealand.
b) Personal data should be respected - no new
blanket powers forcing communications
companies to store more of our data.
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The Bill compels service providers to retain
data about all their customers and empowers
many public bodies to access it with limited
controls. The USA and other European and
Commonwealth countries do not compel service
providers to retain their customers’ weblogs for
inspection by law enforcement and Australia
recently passed legislation strictly prohibiting it.
Going down this road would put us in the company
of Russia which requires service providers to
routinely store the weblogs of all their customers.
Also, the bulk retention of data makes it more
vulnerable – the Joint Committee on the Draft
Communications Data Bill concluded that it would
create a “honey pot for casual hackers,
blackmailers, criminals large and small from
around the world and foreign states”.
c)Targeted not mass surveillance.
Surveillance should only be conducted for
tightly defined reasons i.e. preventing and
detecting serious crime and preventing loss of
life. Requests and warrants should target
individuals on the basis of suspicion of
criminal activity. There should be a targeted,
as opposed to a mass, approach to
communications data retention and interception.
Routine interception of entire telecommunications
systems carrying billions of innocent
communications, as revealed by Edward
Snowden, should not be permitted. Additional
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protection should be provided for privileged
and confidential material such as legally
privileged communications, journalistic sources
and parliamentarians’ correspondence.
d) Transparency and Redress.
Surveillance powers should be publicly
disclosed and safeguards set out in
legislation. There should be improved redress
and increased transparency for those who
have been under unlawful surveillance or are
no longer under suspicion. The present situation
where unlawful surveillance only comes to light as
a result of a chance leaks, whistle blowing or
action by organisations like Liberty and concerned
citizens is most unsatisfactory.
Once a criminal investigation involving
surveillance has been completed, or once a
person is no longer under any suspicion, he or she
should be notified of the relevant surveillance
unless there is an objectively justifiable reason for
maintaining secrecy.
e)Consideration should be given to making
intercepted communications admissible in
criminal trials on a case by case basis, with
appropriate safeguards for all parties.
There is no reasonable justification for maintaining
the blanket bar on intercept admissibility. Lifting
the ban would result in an increase in successful
prosecutions for serious offences. The latest Privy
Council review into the issue which reported in
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December 2014 concluded that a properly funded
use of intercept material as evidence may result in
a “significant increase in the number of successful
prosecutions.”
The counter-argument is that permitting the
admissibility of intercept evidence would reveal
sensitive methods used by the security services or
would subject their activities to too great a
scrutiny. However, there are adequate systems in
place to protect sensitive information which can
easily be used to prevent the security services
being compromised. If material obtained by
bugging, interception by foreign authorities and
hacking can be made admissible, there is no
logical or coherent case for excluding intercept,
with appropriate safeguards. Successive
Government initiated reviews over the past two
decades have concluded that intercept should be
made admissible.
f) Fair and open international data sharing laws.
The arrangements for intelligence sharing of
surveillance data between the UK and other
countries should be set out in law and available to
the public.
g) Safeguard our country’s security by protecting
- not undermining - encryption standards.
Encryption is vital to the security of our online
communications. Powers in the Bill which enable
Government agencies to require service providers
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to remove encryption seriously threatens the
security we all depend on for our personal
communications making them vulnerable to use
and abuse by criminals.
h) Recognition of the unique threat hacking
poses to our security.
The Bill includes significant powers for the
authorities to carry out hacking on a large scale.
Hacking is a grave privacy intrusion - much more
intrusive than “traditional” forms of state
surveillance, including interception, and its
capacity to undermine device, network and
internet security can’t be overstated. It carries
unlimited and untested potential for Government to
act against the security and economic interests of
its own citizens, whether consciously or otherwise.
There must be an informed public and
parliamentary debate over the circumstances in
which hacking can ever be lawful and exceptional
safeguards to govern its use
The proposers appreciate that these are complex
issues which Unitarians will wish to consider carefully.
Good sources of further information are:
https://www.bigbrotherwatch.org.uk/draftinvestigatory-powers-bill-campaign/
https://www.liberty-humanrights.org.uk/campaigning/safe-and-sound
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and the Penal Affairs Panel presentation at the GA
meetings.
The issues may be complex but the powers which
the Bill will hand to Government agencies if it
becomes law will affect each and every one of us.
So please join the debate on our motion to help
ensure our security and our privacy into the
future.
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Motion 4
AGM 08/16
FROM GOLDERS GREEN UNITARIANS
Syria: a call for an urgent Unitarian humanitarian
response
If the war in Syria and its resultant refugee exodus of
millions constitute, according to the United Nations,
the International Red Cross and other international
agencies, the worst humanitarian crisis since the
Second World War is there not a moral imperative on
us to act?
Fighting in Syria has forced over 10 million people to
flee their homes, over 4 million refugees now living
now in exile outside the country. More than 250,000
have been killed and many more seriously injured.
Right now millions of people are in urgent need of
food, water, shelter and healthcare. This huge
humanitarian crisis shows no sign of ending.
The British Red Cross is therefore urgently appealing
for desperately needed funds to support people in
Syria and neighbouring countries seriously affected by
this ongoing conflict and massive refugee exodus.
Millions of people have fled from Syria to Jordan,
Lebanon, Iraq and Turkey. Many have found
themselves separated from loved ones and are
desperately struggling to find shelter and a way to
earn a living. The British Red Cross is working
with partners in the Red Cross and Red Crescent
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Movement to give these refugees the vital help they
so urgently need but funds are fast running out.
‘The British Red Cross has been helping in Syria
since before the unrest began. We have now scaled
up our response and are providing support across the
region. Every day we get food, water, blankets,
soap and other essential help to people caught up in
Syria’s terrible conflict. We’re helping people deal with
the psychological impact of years of violence and
have worked to fix water networks and health
services, so cutting the risk of deadly diseases. Much
of the help is given by staff and volunteers of the
Syrian Arab Red Crescent. The British Red Cross has
been working with the Syrian Arab Red Crescent
since 2004, helping the organisation prepare for a
range of disasters. Their reputation for neutrality
means we can send help where other aid
agencies cannot. But these brave men and
women still face huge risks—dozens have been killed
in the line of duty.’
If you wish to respond to this urgent Red Cross appeal
please kindly make your cheque payable to
the British Red Cross and send it to the Clara Barton
Syria Interfaith Appeal, British Red Cross, 44
Moorfields, London EC2Y 9AL and mark it for Laura
Deacon, the administrator of the Clara Barton
Disasters Emergency Appeal. Thanks.
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Unitarian patrons of this appeal:
Rev. John Clifford (GA President), Rev. Eric Cherry
(IARF and UUA), Rev. Dr William F. Schulz
(President, UU Service Committee), Rev. Dr Richard
Boeke (IARF and World Congress of Faiths).
Other Unitarian signatories:
Joyce Ashworth, Rev. David Ayton, Rev. Elizabeth
Birtles, Rev. Alex Bradley, Rev. Jean Bradley, Dawn
Buckle (Honorary Member), Rev. John P. Carter, Rev.
Celia Cartwright, Bruce Chilton, Sir Philip Colfox, Joan
Cook, Rev. Jim Corrigall, Rev. Cody Coyne, Rev.
Danny Crosby, Rev. Bill Darlison, David Dawson
(Honorary Member), Joy Foster, Rev. Sheena
Gabriel, Rev. Dr Peter Godfrey (Honorary Member),
Rev. Winnie Gordon, Rev. Peter Hewis, Rev. Ashley
Hills, Rev. Jo James, Rev. Bob Janis-Dillon, Rev.
Anna Jarvis, Rev. J. Eric Jones (Honorary Member),
Rev. Lindy Latham, Rev. Art Lester, Neville Kenyon,
Rev. Margaret Kirk, Rev. James McClelland
(Honorary Member), Rev. Tony McNeile, Rev. John
Midgley, Rev. Dr Ann Peart, Rev. Gillian Peel, Rev.
June Pettitt, Dr Andy Phillips, Rev. Lynne Readett,
Rev. Cliff Reed, Rev. Lewis Rees, Rev. Maud
Robinson, Alan Ruston, Rev. Phil Silk, Christina
Smith, Rev. Matthew Smith, Rev. Dr David Steers,
Rev. Dr Arthur Stewart, Mike Tomlin (Honorary
Member), Rev. Shammy Webster, Rev. Martin
Whitell, Dr Rob Whiteman, Rev. Kate Whyman, Rev.
Robert Wightman, Rev. Sue Woolley, Unitarian Peace
Fellowship.
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Interfaith signatories:
Rev. Dr Marcus Braybrooke, Co-president, World
Congress of Faiths (Anglican), Pejman Khojasteh,
Hon. Treasurer, World Congress of Faiths (Muslim),
Rev. Feargus O’Connor, Hon. Secretary, World
Congress of Faiths (Unitarian), Jehangir Sarosh OBE,
Secretary General, European Council of Religious
Leaders, Co-president, World Council of Religions for
Peace (Zoroastrian), Rabbi Jackie Tabick, Copresident, World Congress of Faiths.
Also supported by Hindu, Jain, Sikh, Buddhist and
Quaker signatories.
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Motion 5
AGM 08/16
FROM NORCLIFFE CHAPEL, STYAL
This motion is a not a “wordy “we are concerned
about climate change”” as Stephen Lingwood says in
his article in the Inquirer (The Inquirer, 14 March
2015). But it is also not Stephen’s “disinvestment from
fossil fuels” suggestion, which is a complex issue. The
motion is a simple, practical motion that each
congregation and each member can take. Hopefully
an appreciation of our congregation’s footprint will
lead on to us assessing our own footprints and
hopefully reducing them. In addition, we need to be
aware of climate change and accept that we have to
elect politicians who will take forward investment and
legislation that will enable our carbon emission to be
reduced. This will cost all of us a significant amount as
electricity, petrol, diesel and gas prices rise
substantially. If we are to have a 50% chance of
keeping below the 2⁰C rise in global temperature by
the end of this century (compared to 1990) then we
have to leave 2/3 of the fossil fuels in the ground (as
the figure below based on McGlade’s and Ekins’
Nature paper shows). The economic consequences of
this, if it is not handled very carefully, could be
absolutely catastrophic1.
There are no easy,
1It
is estimated that Saudi Aramco could be worth up to 20
times as much as Exxon Mobil Corp. , the largest nonstate-controlled publicly listed oil company with a market
valuation of $317 billion. Both are some of the largest
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“painless” solutions to one of the greatest problems
facing mankind.
However, the Paris Agreement (the U.N. Framework
Convention
on
Climate
Change
(UNFCCC)
Conference of the Parties (COP21) in Paris in
December 2015) is a very welcome development. But
countries need to sign up from April 2016 to April
2017 with new Intended Nationally Determined
Contributions (INDCs) and appropriate national
legislation. The INDCs will largely determine whether
the world achieves the ambitious 2015 agreement and
companies in the world which affect the stock markets and
bond markets where our pensions and savings are tied up.
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is put on a path toward a low-carbon, climate-resilient
future.
Brief details of the Paris Agreement 2015
The UNFCCC Climate Change meeting in Paris,
where all the nations of the world (196 countries and
the EU) agreed the Paris Agreement, is a very
welcome outcome as it included the USA, China and
India (large polluters) which were not included in the
Kyoto Protocol.
In the long 32-page Agreement it recognises “that
climate change represents an urgent and potentially
irreversible threat to human societies and the planet…
recognizing that deep reductions in global emissions
will be required… consistent with holding the increase
in the global average temperature to well below 2 °C
above pre-industrial levels and pursuing efforts to limit
the temperature increase to 1.5 °C above preindustrial levels… recognizing the urgent need to
enhance the provision of finance, technology and
capacity-building support” for developing countries.
The latter is estimated to be $100b a year.
“Resolves to enhance the provision of urgent and
adequate finance, technology and capacity-building
support by developed country Parties in order to
enhance the level of ambition of pre-2020 action by
Parties, and in this regard strongly urges developed
country Parties to scale up their level of financial
support, with a concrete roadmap to achieve the goal
of jointly providing USD 100 billion annually by 2020
for mitigation and adaptation while significantly
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increasing adaptation finance from current levels and
to further provide appropriate technology and
capacity-building support”
However, the actual financial USD 100 billion annually
is not specifically mentioned in the actual Agreement
(the 29 Articles of the Agreement are in the Annex).
The important Article 2 states:
“(a) Holding the increase in the global average
temperature to well below 2 °C above pre-industrial
levels and to pursue efforts to limit the temperature
increase to 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels,
recognizing that this would significantly reduce the
risks and impacts of climate change;
(b) Increasing the ability to adapt to the adverse
impacts of climate change and foster climate
resilience and low greenhouse gas emissions
development, in a manner that does not threaten food
production;
(c) Making finance flows consistent with a pathway
towards low greenhouse gas emissions and climateresilient development.”
Practical information for chapels
From the Church of England (CofE) Energy Audit
Report 2012/13, Shrinking the Footprint At the start of
the report the Bishop of London, Richard Chartres
says, “In the 21st Century, in an interconnected world,
practicing love of neighbours means that we are
committed to mitigate the effects of climate change
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which will fall disproportionately on the poor and
vulnerable in the world”.
A table of consumptions from the CofE report:
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For further information, see: ‘Ethics and politics of
Climate Change’, Alex Warleigh-Lack, and ‘We must
make changes for the sake of our Children, Stephen
Lingwood, The Inquirer, 14 March 2015. A larger
paper is available from Prof. Geoff Levermore, at
Styal.
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Motion 6
AGM 08/16
FROM TWELVE FULL MEMBERS
The purpose of this motion on the challenge of climate
change is to offer our General Assembly, Districts,
Affiliated Societies and perhaps more especially
congregations and individuals a clear framework to
envision a holistic and dynamic response that accords
with the best understandings of our evolving faith
tradition - and also with our own inner, personal sense
of what is right. The motion seeks to do this by
emphasising that, in terms of Unitarian involvement,
the response requires action in three areas - the
personal,
the
congregational,
and
the
communal/societal; each area must be addressed to
a significant degree if all of us are to have maximum
impact in helping change humanity's current
destructive course.
The Global Context
While until very recently the reality of climate change
was not necessarily noticeable in the lives of
individual people, this situation has altered remarkably
with the increasing frequency of extreme weather
events - both abroad and in the UK too. From a
scientific point of view it is difficult to attribute climate
change as a cause of any individual event but, over
time, an unmistakeable pattern emerges in terms of
the frequency and severity of extreme weather,
whether this is intense in nature (such as the growing
frequency and severity of storms, causing massive
damage and loss of life) or less dramatic - such as the
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drought that is being experienced in California, and
also in Syria prior to the current civil war there.
The response by politicians over decades has been
pitifully slow. Governments increasingly have closer
and closer ties to multinational corporations that exist
to maximise short-term profit for shareholders, with
little regard to broader issues of human and ecological
welfare and sustainability. Increasing evidence is
emerging, for example, that fossils fuel companies
such as Exxon were well aware how burning CO2
causes global warming decades ago but hid what they
knew.
The results of the United Nations Conference on
Climate Change last December are judged by some to
have been more positive than expected - principally
because more than 180 countries had made pledges
to curb emissions and the countries present agreed to
keep temperature rises to below 2 degrees Celsius
above pre-industrial levels. However, among the
grave shortcomings are that international aviation and
shipping (from which emissions are expected to rise
dramatically) are ignored in the targets1. Additionally,
a December 2016 article in New Internationalist
magazine by Danny Chivers and Jess Worth2
1
- INFOGRAPHIC: The COP21 decisions at a glance
http://www.euractiv.com/sections/developmentpolicy/infographic-cop21-decisions-glance-320520
2 Paris Deal: Epic Fail on a Planetary Scale
http://newint.org/features/web26
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suggests the Paris agreement has failed in a major
way in four areas. Namely, to:
' 1. Catalyze immediate, urgent and drastic emission
reductions; 2. Provide adequate support for
transformation; 3. Deliver justice for impacted people;
4. Focus on genuine, effective action rather than false
solutions.2
Specifically on the fourth point, Chivers and Worth
allege that the "the purposefully slippery language [of
the Agreement] allows for the possibility of continued
fossil fuel burning 'offset' by 'removals' via dubious
carbon capture, geoengineering or forestry schemes"
- in other words a focus on anything but renewable
energy! We might reasonably ask "In whose interests
is such a perverse approach?"
Furthermore, commentators have pointed out that
agreed pledges made by countries at the Paris
conference, even if implemented fully, still put us on a
trajectory of global warming in the range of 2.4-2.7
degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels - well
above the 2 degrees Celsius or preferably 1.5
degrees Celsius limit considered essential to avoid
catastrophic climate change3. All in all, there is no
room for complacency that we can now leave the
exclusive/2015/12/12/cop21-paris-deal-epi-fail-onplanetary-scale/
3 COP21 and Free Trade by Aleksandra Conevska
http://mironline.ca/?p=7897
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issue of climate change safely in the hands of the
politicians.
WHAT MUST WE DO NOW?
This motion challenges Unitarians to act in three
areas - personal lifestyle, the congregational level
(principally this relates to our buildings), and creating
or supporting alliances with other organisations in civil
society. The motion aims, as far as possible, to be
self-explanatory but these points may be helpful:
1. Personal Lifestyle Put simply, Unitarians as
individuals can choose to become fully informed about
the issues and then make rational, compassionate
and future-oriented responses in our daily personal
decisions, consistent with our humane values. For
example, not all properties may be suitable for solar
panels and not everyone can afford to install but we
can choose to switch our electricity supply to a
renewable provider (such as Good Energy or
Ecotricity).
2. Action at Congregational Level A motion being
put forward by Styal congregation goes into the
energy efficiency angle in more detail. Though the
relatively traditional theological language might be offputting for some, congregations can also explore Eco
Church - an ecumenical initiative launched in January
2016 where congregations can gain awards for their
environmental
focus
and
consciousness
http://ecochurch.arocha.org.uk. Unitarian bodies may
now also wish to consider divestment action from
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fossil fuel companies, or banks that support such
investments. Perhaps this latter issue deserves a GA
motion of its own!
3. Civil Society Whether it's taking part in local
community energy initiatives, or raising concerns
through letters to politicians or even public protest,
Unitarians must be visibly engaged with other people
of goodwill in demanding and making truly rapid
changes to how we live so that we do our fair share as
a nation to mitigate climate change. This surely
includes opposing attempts by the fossil fuel industry
to put profit before people and the environment
through new fossil fuel extraction technologies and
schemes. The scientific evidence shows beyond
reasonable doubt that we need to make the change to
renewable energy - or certainly away from fossil fuels
- as quickly and completely as possible.4 (N.B. This
motion has purposely not sought to address the
question of nuclear power as the serious alleged pros
and cons do not principally relate to climate change
but other issues).
Note: GA Background: A 2014 emergency GA
motion welcoming the IPCC report Climate Change
2014 Impacts, Adaptations and Vulnerability was
referred back. As it arose in response to that
particular report it was felt, after wide consultations, by
the then proposer and seconder that a completely
4
http://www.greenpeace.org.uk/newsdesk/energy/
analysis/what-exactly-ipcc-saying-emissions-phase-out
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new motion on climate would be needed due to the
lapse of time following publication. Our General
Assembly has also passed resolutions on
environmental sustainability (1994), Green Theology
(1994), environmental audit (1996), Kyoto protocols
(2001), carbon footprints (2007), interdependent web
(2014). It is the contention of the proposers of the
current motion that the wording provides a necessary
update and addition to former resolutions by
presenting the climate change issue in a holistic way,
with its threefold approach.
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