Climate Change: Migration

Lord Bishop of Gloucester Excerpts

Thursday 14th September 2023 Lords Chamber

[The Lord Bishop of Gloucester]

My Lords, it is a delight to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle. I am grateful to the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, for bringing this debate and raising this important issue. It touches on two of the primary challenges that we face in the 21st century; as we have heard, they are deeply connected. We heard astounding statistics, such as that, by 2050, perhaps 200 million people will be displaced due to climate change.

I was reminded of many of the weather events of this summer in Europe. We saw about 19,000 people evacuated from Rhodes due to wildfires; there were images of holidaymakers fleeing but being given refuge and hospitality by local people. We saw temperature red alerts and the hottest June on record globally. This is the climate crisis close up and, at the most basic level, it involved the movement of people and the support of other people—a small snapshot of a much larger global issue.

Just recently, at a refugee and asylum seekers service in Gloucestershire, we had a conversation about the fact that some regions of the planet are becoming uninhabitable and simply will not be able to adapt to extreme temperatures. A recent report published by Christian Aid pointed to research that supports what we have already heard: higher temperatures will lead to greater projected asylum applications to European countries.

However, as we have also heard, we need to keep this in perspective, set against the backdrop of millions of people displaced within their own countries and across neighbouring borders. I, too, was going to talk about Somalia but we have heard about that already. What is really important is that so many people across our world are being displaced for reasons other than climate change, such as war or persecution, and then discovering that the effects of climate change are adding to their suffering. Another example concerns the Rohingya refugees in Bangladesh, who are being further impacted by adverse weather disasters due to climate change.

None of this can be separated from the issues of poverty that underlie all we are talking about. The option of air conditioning simply does not exist in many places where people live across our world and the world’s poorest are bearing the burden of the climate crisis, which is not of their making. We also know that, for a whole host of reasons, the impact of climate change is predicted to affect women and girls disproportionately; we have already heard about children. It is not surprising that people are on the move. It is simply not an option for us to pull up the drawbridge and leave others to deal with the consequences of global migration. Working with our European partners is a practical necessity to deal with a crisis that is global in scale. As we have already heard, we have a collective responsibility to work with our European partners; many of those bodies have already been named. We cannot expect other countries to pick up the tab when we hold so many of the resources.

There are practical questions that we must address. The issue of the definition of a refugee has already been mentioned. The refugee convention described a refugee as

“someone unable or unwilling to return to their country of origin owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted”.

That reflected the realities of 1951, not 2023. We would be wise to explore a more extensive definition that takes into account the drivers of migration that have developed over the past 70 years and, in particular, reflects the way in which climate change affects migration patterns. One way of addressing this is to invest further in climate adaptation, as well as in loss and damage payments, to help people respond to the impact of climate change in the countries where they live. It would be good if the Minister could say what is being done to address this.

One day last year, at the Lambeth conference, bishops from across the world gathered in the grounds of Lambeth Palace on one of the hottest days of the year. The grass was like straw. We sat in the shade of marquees and heard stories about the effects of climate change on real lives in real places. Some of it was very hard to hear. We had food that day—extremely good food—and plenty of water as we talked and listened to one another but many of the stories I heard were about climate change devastating food production, the failure of crops and people no longer being able to survive in the places of their communities. We also heard stories of hope. For example, I heard of churches in Uganda providing seedlings for tree planting and of the church in Kenya teaching and encouraging dryland farming, but all of it requires investment so that people can stay and build strong communities where they are.

This is an issue of justice. For me, as a Christian, that really matters, so I am grateful for this debate, which has highlighted the need for us not simply to keep looking for instant solutions to a problem that is about us here in the UK endeavouring to manage the inflow of people. This is about the need to work closely with European and other partners to engage in a courageous global vision and seek long-term and often slow but persistent ways to address the push factors, as well as just ways of managing the flows of increased movement across Europe.