I'm Damian Gale, an environment correspondent at the Guardian.
So I'm just in Westminster now —
I just wondered where the action was?
I've covered the climate crisis extensively.
So what did you get put in jail for? - By breeching the injunction, twice.
When did you get released? - Just last week
But the UK is also now facing an urgent cost of living crisis.
'Millions of people are being forced to choose between heating and eating.'
Both issues have big campaign movements, with people increasingly willing to take action on the streets.
We've got XR protesters over here and cost of living and trade union campaigners over there.
So what's happening — are you part of their protest or are they part of your protest?
I can't afford oil and gas and neither can the planet. That is absolutely the link.
But how will they come together, in what people are predicting will be an autumn of anger and action?
We'll have differences with Extinction Rebellion but they're very welcome here.
Austerity affects every worker.
'Enough is enough. Enough is enough. Enough is enough.'
We wanted to start this journey by meeting some of the people most affected by austerity.
We were invited to a breakfast club in Birkenhead,
an area that has seen a rapid rise in the number of people living in fuel poverty, ...
No thank you — it's too early for me.
I'm having a break from washing up this weekend.
... where we found labor MP Mick Whitley was doing the dishes.
So are you volunteering here every week? - Yeah every Sunday.
And you said you've seen a rise in numbers, when did that start to happen?
I've worked at the council for 20 years and it's only the past two years where everything's been going up and up and up.
We've been on the pay freeze for the past 10 years.
Society has kind of overtaken us now,
so where we used to be on good wages, we're not anymore.
My job qualified me for a mortgage 15 years ago, my job now qualifies me for benefits,
so it just shows the difference and that's through government policy.
As well as a hot breakfast and a space to keep warm for a few hours,
they give out a food bag for people to take home.
Andy, can you show us what you've got?
You come out of the house as often as you can to save your leccy [electricity].
Even though it's only a couple of hours, to me, that's a couple of hours extra telly I'll get.
Three heart attacks in one day and you've had to come back to a flat that you can't heat?
Yeah, yeah. I go to the neighbours for a bath because I can't heat the water.
So have things become more difficult for you recently? - Yeah.
What kinds of things have become more difficult?
How does it make you feel when the gas bill comes in and hits the door?
Bad, because I want to pay, I do want to pay my way now.
It only benefits the rich.
The budget she's just done the other day, trickle down economics, it does nothing for us.
As the breakfast service wraps up, the volunteers pack up supplies
to take to the Liverpool dockers, who are on a two-week strike over pay nearby.
The dockers were the latest in a number of industries who've taken part in the summer of strikes,
mostly asking for more pay as food and fuel prices go up
All the lads are bringing in their own chairs, set up a few little gazebos and stuff like that.
We've got generators here. They're doing the cooking and all that.
It must get kind of cold here during the night, it's cold now.
Yeah, it gets freezing overnight, yeah.
The official picket line, which is down here.
And what kind of situation are your members in when it comes to the cost of living?
One of our lads told me it's costing them something like £140 a week, just to get to work.
You know, it's just not on is it?
We're not asking for the world, what we're asking is a few crumbs to get us through inflation.
Do you think that that understanding is cutting through finally with the
wider public, that actually is something deeply unfair going on?
The general public, you know, need to start standing up now
and I'm saying enough is enough, you know what I mean.
Casualise everything again, privatise everything again, you know, and then, you know, where's it going to go?
And it's the time to do it and the Tories, they might change all the laws
around picketing and striking now.
On the picket lines, they're using the words: 'enough is enough'.
That is also the name of a new campaign, which is building off the energy of industrial disputes
to demand the government taxes the rich and slashes energy bills.
I think this country is ready for a change.
If the working classes united across all it's aspects,
we will force those politicians to come back to our values
and if we can do that,
along with the new elements that we've got to bring into our movement; the climate campaigners ...
Its star performers are RMT head, Mick Lynch, and the MP for Coventry south, Zara Sultana.
... stands up for us in communities, stands up for us on the picket line,
please give a massive, massive welcome to the brilliant Zara Sultana MP.
Liverpool, it's so good to be back. I was literally here like two weeks ago and I can't get enough.
Millions of people being forced to choose between heating and eating,
that's in the sixth largest economy in the world, where there isn't a shortage of wealth
or resources — the problem is the greedy fuckers that run this country have hoarded all of that wealth.
I was struck that Mick mentioned climate activists as one of the many groups to engage,
but it didn't feel like a central issue to Enough is Enough
so I wanted to ask Zara, who is also a champion for the green movement,
how she sees these two issues coming together.
The climate doesn't really feature on Enough is Enough's list of demands.
Why is it that climate doesn't appear?
We know the climate emergency is the most threatening issue and the most worrying issue
in terms of future generations.
When we have policies like renationalising our utilities,
it's about addressing the climate emergency as well because there's no way that we can decarbonise
at the scale we need to, unless we take utilities and rail into public ownership.
And while we're not using perhaps the language of the climate movement, it's not something that is separate.
Do you think it's that traditional climate campaigning can be alienating to some people?
There are people who are
impacted by the climate emergency but don't see it in that way,
so they will look at issues to do with their homes not being insulated,
shoddy housing, all of these issues, but not see it through the lens of
this is what we need to address the issue of climate catastrophe.
Some trade unions have been accused of being hostile to sustainable solutions,
which they consider as threatening to their members' jobs and their terms.
If we are going to have a just transition, it has to be worker-led
and the jobs that we are trying to create within a more greener fair economy also have to be
unionised jobs, that are highly skilled and well paid,
and therefore you can't have a successful movement
without workers feeling like they are involved and without trade unions feeling like
they are respected and seen as equal partners.
Climate activists Just Stop Oil are quite hopeful of engaging in some non-violent civil disobedience —
Do you see that those kind of tactics can never be part of a cost of living campaign?
Enough is enough have already picked and decided what our strategy is,
which is to engage and have mass broad support
to bring people from the trade union movement, the labour movement and, you know, the political sphere,
as well as ordinary working people, and we're asking people to do the actions that we want, of course
people will do whatever they like, but it's not something that we would personally be endorsing.
We're outside King's Cross station and today is supposed to be the day that the energy price cap is lifted.
So, we've got a national day of action from Enough is Enough,
got pickets all around taking strike action,
but at the same time over there, we've got the climate activists of Extinction Rebellion.
Hoping to get a prize for the smallest banner. - I think you might be the front runner.
Okay, so I think this is the RMT picket, they're coming down the road.
Mick Lynch is there at the front.
Mick, I'm Damien from the Guardian. - Oh hi, how you doing?
How are you doing, yeah?
Just wondering about how you're feeling about today?
Well, the issue is common for everyone; the government is not prepared to assist us through taxing the rich,
so industrial action and community action and social action has got to be the way forward.
So we've got the climate protesters from Extinction Rebellion over there — how do you feel,
is there any synergy between your movement and what they're calling for?
Everybody's got a different path to the same objective, which is to make a more equal world and a sustainable world.
We will have differences with Extinction Rebellion but they're very welcome here.
I mean, I'm here as a member of Extinction Rebellion but I'm also a member of a union, I'm also a pensioner,
so obviously, you know, all these issues for me, personally, come together.
So the Enough is Enough campaign, they've got speakers who've articulated their demands
but they don't really, they don't mention the climate crisis.
I think it's true that unions have their own, possibly narrower, view for their membership.
We in XR, you know, we're non-partisan, we're not political, we're not
affiliated in any way, so we can take a broader view and hopefully carry other people with us.
Do you want the back?
Postman Pat supports the kitchen workers union.
And make some noise as you welcome to the stage the RMT general secretary, Mick Lynch.
We are part of a progressive movement.
Whatever we've had in the past, there are differences.
Whether it's based on an ideology or where we're from, we have to pull that to one side,
hold hands together, put your arms around each other.
We are workers, we refuse to be divided and, let's say it and cheer it, we refuse to be poor anymore.
As the Enough is Enough rally wrapped up, we followed the climate protesters
down to Westminster, where we were expecting to see some civil disobedience.
The problem we've got is, you've closed the bridges. - There's a lot of these cars trying to get through as well.
Is there anything I can say to persuade you to move?
So we were just up in Kings Cross where they were having — - Yeah, we were there.
You were at the Enough is Enough rally? - Yeah.
How can you reconcile the problems with cost of living? It seems so immediate with the climate crisis,
which to a lot of people, I guess, who are struggling to feed themselves or to heat their homes, seem remote.
I think it's the beginning of those links being made, but I don't think it's necessarily, you know —
people are struggling to pay their bills and that is sometimes a thing that takes over, I think.
At a moment we're asking people to move on to the pavements for your safety and the safety of others
but at some point that may change to, you know,
we're now going to be warning you to move or you might be arrested.
Do you think that these climate campaigners have got a good enough understanding
of social justice issues and how that intersects with,
with their campaign and their cause?
I don't think all of them have, but I think that's partly what Black Socks,
the organisation I'm with, the social movement, have signed an allyship agreement with Just Stop Oil to say
that we will bring that very strong colonial, anti-colonial, neocolonial anti-racist perspective.
I think after the death of George Floyd, what we saw is two things; global movement for climate change
and a global movement for social justice in relation to Black Lives Matter, so post-George Floyd
is a new analysis and that analysis is we need to bring climate change justice,
social justice, climate reparations and international debt campaigns all together.
In order we create a civil rights alliance, that is capable of moving the dial and pushing this government back.
The protesters had blocked four bridges but were now rallying in Parliament Square.
I'm just in Westminster now, I just wondered where the action was? I heard Four Bridges were blocked earlier.
As the crowds grew, we started seeing familiar faces from previous environmental protests.
Enough is Enough, they've had a rally up in King's Cross
and they haven't mentioned the climate at all in their demands.
So what do you think about that? Do you think that they're missing out on an important aspect of what's going on?
I think they are missing out on an important aspect,
but also ordinary people,
people of this country have a whole range of issues that are going on in their lives
and the climate crisis is just one of them.
The root of it is all the same and we should be in closer coalition, we should be together
and I hope we will in the future.
I spoke to Zara Sultana earlier in the week in Liverpool
and how she was reluctant for people involved in that cost of living campaign to get involved in
non-violent civil disobedience and direct action.
You have to be ready to be arrested and with that comes a lot of barriers and inequality in that system,
and asking people to join into that is quite a big thing
and maybe that campaign doesn't want to do that, they want to work more
through people taking action of their own kind.
We should work together and not be against each other because
that's never going to get us anywhere.
That's just politics, that's what they want, and actually I think their campaign is amazing.
This day was just the beginning for Just Stop Oil,
who continued with their street blockades in Westminster, with dozens of arrests.
And the RMT and other unions were continuing with their strikes and campaigning with Enough is Enough.
The campaign's green credentials got a boost when the Green party became the
first political party to officially endorse them.
We've learned there are deep synergies, really,
between the solutions needed for the cost of living campaigns or the cost of living crisis
and the solutions needed to tackle the climate crisis and that the two movements
can find a way to meet in the middle, but they're just not there yet.