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well first it can I said thank you for
joining us a very good evening to you
and this the president's lecture our
speaker also has a wide range of
interests and interesting background so
not just the chair of the Environment
Agency I think she got there by a whole
range of different experiences not least
of all the boards and advisory
committees which cluded share action
men-hattan PLC the princes accounting
for sustainability project and green
finance Institute's all of which are
quite challenging organizations but has
worked in financial services for over 25
years in corporate finance and fund
management as director of stewardship at
Jupiter Asset Management until July 2014
she wasn't integral to the development
of their expertise in the corporate
governance and sustainability feels so
we look forward to hearing from her the
critical challenges to protecting
environment and more importantly
supporting that sustainable development
the thesis of my speech tonight is that
everyone in society government
businesses and individuals needs to put
the climate emergency at the heart of
everything they do this work should not
be in a box labeled environmental issues
it should not be given a cursory ten
minutes at the board meeting before
everyone gets back to the business of
business the climate crisis is the
business of business it must become a
default part of our thinking otherwise
the dark and stormy nights of the coming
decades will not only be much scarier
they will have an insurmountable
damaging effect on communities nature
and the economy but I am NOT the ghost
of Christmas yet to come here only to
conjure a nightmarish apparition of the
future I am positive about our prospects
my message today is that there's still
everything to play for last week on the
northern Danish coast a 120 year old
120 ton lighthouse was put on skates
unmov'd 70 metres inland to save it from
coastal erosion the lighthouse that was
rescued from the sea sounds like a
children's book but drone footage of the
fast minaret like structure gliding
slowly across sand dunes made it a
global news story the ruptured region of
Denmark is popular with tourists it was
decided that the cultural and aesthetic
value of this non-operational lighthouse
was worth securing for another 40 years
when it comes to coastal erosion and
flood plan the priority for authorities
is to protect life but saving this
lighthouse was not that it says
something about the way people want to
live when we talk about the horrors of
the climate emergency an extinction
rebellion a right that we must tell the
truth about this we should also think
about the resilience of what we value
now the coastline has never been static
there has always been coastal erosion
rivers changed direction there have
always been floods and droughts in the
UK just as there have always been
typhoons in Japan so when you read an
article about the latest record-breaking
climate event it often comes with a
sidebar of analysis titled is this
climate change last year the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change said we have 12 years to hold
global warming to 1.5 degrees above
pre-industrial levels and even if we do
the physical impacts like storms and
heat waves will increase the IPCC's
report is not only momentous because of
what it says it is a towering
achievement because it managed to get
scientists and government officials from
40 different countries to agree on a
single document last month the IPCC
released a new report saying that once a
century sea level events will be annual
events by 2050 so while we can agree
that such things have always happened we
must also agree that the multiplying
effect of the climate emergency means we
have new questions to answer a farmer
might overcome a few dry summers with
some tactical decisions about what to
plant and where
but a long-term shift in climate means
fundamental changes to the business or
running the risk of ruin the climate
emergency is now a fundamental threat to
every area of modern life so our
response must be a default part of
everything everything we do one of the
leaders I look to is the former
president of Island Mary Robinson who
said to the Guardian last year I don't
think as a human race that we can be so
stupid that we can't face an existential
threat together and find a common
humanity and solidarity to respond to it
because we do have the capacity and the
means to do it if we have the political
will so I applaud David Attenborough who
said earlier this year the Garden of
Eden is no more fresh Ethan Berg who
said I want you to panic an extinction
rebellion who have appropriated rabbi
hillel famous quote if not now when
because bringing these issues to the
front of people's minds gets as past
debating whether or not the latest
natural disaster is climate change and
focuses minds on what action we must
take to reduce the risks and prepare for
new extremes we need to get better at
clearly assessing climate risks and
opportunities and better our pooling our
expertise and resources across
communities sectors and international
borders if people would rather put a
lighthouse on skates and spoil the view
then humans have what it takes to
overcome the climate emergency but no
one can wait for leadership tomorrow
we must all get our own skates on today
[Applause]
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