Hundreds showed up in Aotea Square and public spaces around the country to call on leaders to start the process of decolonisation through climate action
Around 200 people marched down Queen Street yesterday calling for quicker and faster protections to the environment, in step with protesters doing the same around the country.
Crowds were down on the enormous turnouts seen at the end of 2019, when 170,000 people across the country turned up to voice their disquiet on the worsening climate crisis.
But although Auckland’s Aotea Square saw just a few hundred people attend, the level of passion and righteous anger was commensurate with those crowds of the past.
“Shit is so bad, even the introverts are here,” read one young person’s sign as they marched along members of climate action group Extinction Rebellion and event organisers Fridays for the Future Tāmaki Makaurau.
It’s the first rally of this size on an issue that has united much of the younger generation (along with a good sprinkling of those around retiree age bolstering the crowd) since the Auckland chapter of School Strike 4 Climate disbanded in June.
Spokespersons from the group said it had deliberately dissolved after judging itself a “racist, white-dominated space” that has “avoided, ignored, and tokenised BIPOC voices and demands, especially those of Pasifika and Māori”.
The impact of climate change on Pasifika and Māori was an issue given centre stage at the protest, with event organisers saying the purpose was to call for climate reparations: "That means governments and corporations need to give stolen land back to Indigenous peoples and provide resources to restore it.”
Zane Wedding of native tree advocate group Mana Rākau said the environmental movement must be paid for by the most powerful in society.
“It must empower the impoverished,” he said. “The environmental movement must reinforce the mana of mana whenua. It must reinvigorate the whenua.”
He said climate action needs to go hand in hand with giving voice to indigenous communities and women.
“Anything else, whānau, is just colonisation,” he said. “The environmental movement must be a part of decolonisation.”
The protest is happening at a crucial time for local politics, which has two weeks to go before the new mayor, councillors and local board members are announced.
Richard Northey is a current Waitematā and Gulf local board member. He said climate action was a bigger issue in this local body election than it had ever been before.
“People are more aware of it. I’ve had people saying we shouldn’t do anything, we should leave it to China and the United States and so on,” he said. “But how are they going to respond to our small voice unless we’re setting an example, as we did on nuclear issues. We’ve got to do our part in order to have an effective voice internationally, in that case right down to the street and community level.”
He was in attendance with fellow local board member and candidate Alex Bonham and Albert-Eden local board candidate Christina Robertson, all of whom have run campaigns on cutting emissions via prioritising public and active modes of transport.
“There need to be changes in the way that people get around,” said Northey. “There needs to be much more use of active and public transport in order to make our contribution towards mitigating climate change.”
He hoped the rally would raise people’s awareness that these issues play out on a local level as well.
“We are standing against people who say we shouldn’t do as much about climate change and people should be able to park and use cars and so on, as they used to,” he said. “We say there’s got to be some change… we want to make sure the people who are prepared to take the most effective actions are those that get elected.”
The rally was echoed across the country, with similar meet-ups in Auckland, Wellington, Christchurch and New Plymouth, with some schools turning a blind eye to students skipping class to go and join the throng.
Other speakers included Bianca Ranson and whānau, representing Protect Pūtiki, the group formed to stop development at Kennedy Point Marina on Waiheke Island.
“We need to make sure when we are talking about climate change, our focus is definitely on the fossil fuel industry,” she said. “But we also need to make sure that we are making our advocacy for our moana, which is our largest carbon sink, as loud as we can.”
She talked about proposals for bottom-trawling and dredging ongoing in the Hauraki Gulf and called on the crowd to sign a petition to send a message to Minister of Oceans and Fisheries David Parker to stop these.
“Our Government has declared a climate emergency - but they have not signed up to 30 percent protection of our oceans by 2030,” she said. “What our Government is saying with the emissions reduction plan does not match declaring a climate emergency.”
Following speeches in Aotea Square, the crowd marched down Queen Street towards Britomart, where people wrote messages on the pavement in chalk.
One moment that crystallised the divided nature of New Zealand society in these pandemic years saw a man on the side of the road shout at the protest, accusing them of membership of a certain German political party that rose to power in the 1930s.
The man seemed to have taken particular offence at the choice by some of the marchers to don a mask, and was audibly worried about the protesters' ability to freely breathe as they made their way down New Zealand’s main drag.
