Sept 23,2021: British Prime Minister Boris Johnson has told global leaders to “grow up” and tackle climate change, as the world faces a now-or-never moment to limit the rise in global temperatures to 1.5C (2.7F) above pre-industrial levels.
Johnson is due to host COP26 – a crucial United Nations climate summit – in the Scottish city of Glasgow in six weeks’ time.
He is using this week’s United Nations General Assembly in New York to press governments on climate action – and the money to pay for it – as scientists warn that global warming is dangerously close to spiralling out of control.
“If we keep on the current track then the temperatures will go up by 2.7 degrees or more by the end of the century, never mind what that will do to the ice floes,” Johnson told the UN General Assembly on Wednesday night. “We will see desertification, drought, crop failure, and mass movements of humanity on a scale not seen before. Not because of some unforeseen natural event or disaster, but because of us, because of what we are doing now.”
In his speech, Johnson compared humanity to an impetuous 16-year-old – “just old enough to get ourselves into serious trouble”.
“We believe that someone else will clear up the mess we make because that is what someone else has always done,” he added. “We trash our habitats again and again with the inductive reasoning that we have got away with it so far, and therefore we will get away with it again.
“My friends, the adolescence of humanity is coming to an end,” Johnson, said, adding: “We must come together in a collective coming of age.”
