Two MPs met 50 constituents to discuss action on the climate and losses of the natural world. 

Olly Glover, MP for Didcot and Wantage, and Freddie Van Mierlo, MP for Henley and Thame, attended the event at Benson Village Hall on Saturday, October 12. 

Colonel George Curtis, from Aston Tirrold, and Dr Sue Roberts organised the meeting on behalf of Wallingford-based Bioabundance Community Interest Company.

Many local community, climate and nature groups were represented. 

Dr Pete Sudbury, deputy leader of Oxfordshire County Council, said: “The climate is warming faster than expected. We are close to hitting irreversible tipping points. 

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Olly Glover and Freddie Van Mierlo (Image: Contributed) “Experts say that any climate action plan allowing over 1.5 degrees C of warming is ‘a fool's errand’. We must stop fossil fuels and repair the damage.

"At the county council, we have a climate program to keep residents’ safe and reduce carbon emissions. We need informed citizens, prepared leaders, and strong community to take action and provide resilience as things get rough.”

Professor Richard Harding from Wallingford, former director for Climate Change Research UKCEH, said: “Climate change is here, now. We are seeing extreme temperatures that have never been seen before, reaching over 55 degrees C in many tropical regions.

"Florida has been hit by two record-breaking hurricanes. Here, farmers are struggling with repeated floods and yields are down 30 per cent.

"Flooding will worsen; massive migration will happen as parts of the world become uninhabitable; our food supply faces disruption. 

“Government departments should work together, prioritising urgent action, a ‘moonshot’ to halt global heating.” 

Dr Sue Roberts, chair of Bioabundance, said “The catastrophic collapse of nature is perhaps the greatest threat to human existence. Worldwide, we have lost three-quarters of our vertebrates in just 50 years.

"Ours is one of the most nature-depleted countries in the world. We are part of nature and rely on it for clean air, water, flood control, breakdown of waste, and of course, food’.

"We must restore swathes of land for nature. We can all play our part by eating less meat and dairy, to release land for nature.”

Mr Glover said “Climate change is an existential problem and technological developments alone are unlikely to solve it. We need to work together to tackle this difficult challenge, and it is important that the Government focuses on it, and not just on economic growth and public service improvements."

Mr Van Mierlo added: “We need a stronger focus on the climate and nature emergencies, with firm plans to reach net zero and put the decline in biodiversity into reverse.

"I’m pleased that my Liberal Democrat colleague Roz Savage is bringing the Climate and Nature Bill to parliament as a private members bill and will stand squarely behind it.” 

For more details about Bioabundance, email bioabundance@gmail.com.