Climate emergency panel to take place at Warwick ahead of climate strikes

A climate emergency panel and Q&A session is set to be held at the University of Warwick ahead of a climate strike on campus on 29 November.

Hosted by Warwick Students’ Union (SU) in support of the Global Climate Strike, the ‘Emergency Briefing Panel’ and Q&A will feature academics from various departments, “all of whom are keen climate activists and advocates in the Warwick community”.

On the panel will be Dr Alastair Smith and Dr Leon Sealey-Huggins from the Global Sustainable Development department, Dr Nick Lawrence from the English and Comparative Literary Studies department, Dr Sam Adelman from the School of Law and Hector Newman, a postgraduate Life Sciences student.

Both “informed and uninformed students, who are eager to gain a greater understanding of the climate emergency” will be able to ask questions regarding the climate crisis and the University’s “role in solving this”.

Currently, the panel is set to take place in Terrace Bar at 12.30pm for an hour.

The event is scheduled to take place before a student-led march to University House at 2pm as part of the Global Climate Strike demonstrations on campus. It will end with “an open mic mass sit-in to protest the University’s ‘inaction’ in its response to the climate crisis”.

Hosted by Extinction Rebellion (XR) University of Warwick, the protest description outlines that “a sit-in is a peaceful, non-violent protest wherein participants sit on the ground for a specified amount of time: a solemn act to protest the University’s inaction to climate catastrophe”.

It is being staged in order to pressure the University to adhere to three demands. These are that the Warwick commits to “absolute” carbon neutrality by 2025, “democratic governance” and “education over business”.

In Coventry, a strike hosted by various groups including XR Coventry, XR Warwick District, XR Rugby and Coventry Climate Action Network (CAN) will take place at the Council Offices, One Friargate to demand that Coventry City Council “shares its emergency plan”.

Climate strikes will be taking place across the world on 29 November as part of the ‘SchoolStrike4Climate’ and ‘FridaysForFuture’ movements.