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Dear Scrutiny
Thank you for allowing us to comment on the Government Plan 2023-2026.
Despite the Government of Jersey's mandate to protect communities and the environment against the inevitable impacts of climate change, recognised in the CM's statement "We live on a beautiful Island - there is so much we value and want to protect". The Government Plan fails to do just that, exposing 100,000 + Islanders to the worst impacts of climate change, hunger, thirst and biological disruptions.
According to the IPCC "reaching 1.5 is likely by 2030, and the probability of stopping warming below 1.5 is approaching zero. Standards and expectations based on the past are rapidly becoming outdated. Heat, drought, deluge, and other stresses will increase, and large-scale biotic feedbacks are likely to intensify. The likelihood of these statistics severely impacting Jersey's food and water security are serious and comes with an increasingly high level of confidence."
The COM doesn't seem to be taking this human-induced threat seriously, with a perceived view that Jersey can simply buy our way out of the problem as it worsens, rather than factoring in historical CO2e emissions and using emissions data to rebuild/ regenerate the Island's supply chain resilience to the worst impacts of climate change.
The simplest way for GOJ to build resilience is by using taxation to reward/ punish corporates willing to take/ not take responsibility for past and current CO2e emissions, support outreach groups and lead credible reductions/ avoidance strategies, removing the need to offset by insetting hard-to- remove CO2e into local nature-based sinks like soil (regenerative farming strategies) and sea beds (when the technology advances permit).
If GOJ is not willing to take a lead by adopting section 6 of the Glasgow accord, what hope do we have as an Island Nation wanting to best insure our future health and prosperity, by building supply chains and ecological/ economic resilience we desperately need in place now, to mitigate the inevitable impacts of climate change?
IPCC - "If we act rapidly to get to zero emissions and find ways to increase carbon stores (increasing Jersey's soil organic carbon levels, which other nations can learn from), we can make reaching 3.0 a low probability. On the current path of emissions, 3.0C will likely be passed in the 2060s. At 3.0, most regions of Earth would have entered a different climate, causing server biological and supply chain disruptions. The climate is extremely unlikely to be stable at this temperature, putting pressure on food and water security, particularly in Island Nations."
The science is clear about what Governments have to do. There is an increasing number of voters who believe GOJ must do more and the Government Plan 2023-2026 is this government's best opportunity to meet international commitments and voters' expectations, which this version falls short of.
Kind regards
Glyn
Glyn Mitchell