‘Teach science behind climate change not morality tale,’ says Amanda SpielmanThe chief inspector of schools in England has pushed back against growing calls to make the national curriculum more diverse, warning against making curriculum changes based on a single issue or purpose.Speaking at the launch of Ofsted’s annual report, Amanda Spielman said there were increasing efforts to “commandeer” schools and the curriculum in support of worthy social issues and campaigns, including environmental causes and tackling racism. Continue reading...

Highways England scheme to encourage species-rich grasslands could create hundreds of miles of rare habitats after decades of lossNative wildflower meadows will line the verges of all new large-scale road projects under an initiative by Highways England, the Guardian can reveal.Nodding blue harebells, clusters of yellow kidney vetch and flashes of bird’s-foot-trefoil could soon become the norm on stretches of the road network in England with the infrastructure provider committing to the creation of biodiverse grasslands as standard on all new major schemes. Continue reading...

Boris Johnson’s advisers did not understand how vital UN Cop26 talks were, former minister tells MPsBoris Johnson’s team had a “cavalier attitude” to hosting a vital UN climate summit in the UK, taking the view “they could wing it with a few press releases and that would all be fine” rather than putting serious work into the talks, the sacked former minister originally in charge has said.Claire O’Neill was appointed by Johnson to head the Cop26 summit in September 2019 but was summarily dismissed on the eve of the launch of the UK’s presidency in February this year. Continue reading...

Young people from 140 countries presented policies to UK climate action championYoung people from 140 countries who attended an online “mock Cop26” climate summit have presented a treaty of 18 policies to Nigel Topping, the UK’s high level climate action champion.After two weeks of negotiations, delegates from the international youth-led conference presented their formal treaty to Topping during the event’s closing ceremony on Tuesday, and called on world leaders to prioritise the policies during Cop26, which was postponed for a year because of the pandemic and is now due to be held in Glasgow in November 2021. Continue reading...

New analysis finds 40% was brought in without sourcing checks from Brazil, Argentina and ParaguayMore than 1m tonnes of soya used by UK livestock farmers to produce chicken and other food last year could be linked to deforestation, according to a new analysis.Large areas of forest in Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay are being cleared to produce soya, which is then exported to the UK to be used by farmers, mainly to feed chickens and dairy cows. Continue reading...

A new study has found that affordable housing in New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey and California will be at particular riskThe amount of affordable housing in the US vulnerable to coastal flooding is set to triple over the next 30 years, a new study has found in a further sign of the escalating hardships faced by low-income Americans amid an unraveling climate crisis.Affordable housing in New York, Massachusetts, New Jersey and California is at particular risk of flooding from worsening storms or even high tides pushed on by rising sea levels, according to research conducted by Climate Central, a New Jersey-based science organization. Continue reading...

Wall is going up in four sections in Arizona’s mountain ranges spanning the US-Mexico border where the cats had reappearedBy the 1960s, the North American jaguar had vanished from the southern US borderland after being hunted to extinction.Yet in the mid-1990s, there was a remarkable discovery: the jaguar had reappeared in the Sky Islands of Arizona, a region of rugged linked mountain ranges spanning the US and Mexico border that boasts the highest biodiversity in inland North America. Since then, the large cats have been seen over a dozen times in the region, reviving hopes of a full return of the elusive predators to the US. Continue reading...

An expert questions the state government betting heavily on a coal and gas-fired recovery after the global slump in fossil fuels hits the 2020-21 budgetQueensland’s coal and petroleum royalties income has collapsed, wiping more than $2bn – about half the revenue initially forecast – from the state’s budget bottom line.But while the global slump in the fossil fuel industry has impacted the pandemic-delayed Queensland 2020-21 budget, the state is betting heavily on a coal and gas-fired recovery in the coming years. Continue reading...

Maximum heat in November was average of 2.9C above long-term mean, despite a La Niña event, which typically brings cooler patternsAustralia has sweltered through its hottest spring and November on record, with both the season and the month more than 2C warmer than the long-term average.Temperatures in spring were 2.03C hotter than average across night and day. In November, they were 2.47C above the long-term mean, which is measured across the years 1961-90. Continue reading...

Great Barrier Reef envoy tells party room the government should be seen as leaders on climate action, not ‘reluctant followers’The Morrison government’s special envoy for the Great Barrier Reef, Warren Entsch, has called for the Coalition to adopt a net zero emissions target by 2050, and endorsed the prime minister’s recent signal that Australia could meet the 2030 target without needing to use carryover credits.During Tuesday’s Coalition party room meeting – the second-last parliamentary gathering for 2020 – Entsch said the government should adopt the net zero target during a contribution where he called for targeted intervention to ensure people in north Queensland were able to access affordable insurance for cyclone events. Continue reading...

Fourteen eminent signatories urge Canberra to commit to net-zero emissions by 2050Pacific leaders have condemned Australia’s Paris climate target as “one of the weakest”, urging Canberra to commit to net-zero carbon emissions by 2050 and abandon its Kyoto carryover credits.Fourteen Pacific leaders, including former presidents and prime ministers, foreign ministers, archbishops and other church leaders, have penned an open leader to the prime minister, Scott Morrison, “as Pacific Islander leaders whose homelands and cultures face certain devastation from climate change”. Continue reading...

An area seven times larger than Greater London has been lost in what one activist called a ‘humiliating and shameful’ destructionA vast expanse of Amazon rainforest seven times larger than Greater London was destroyed over the last year as deforestation surged to a 12-year high under Brazil’s far-right president Jair Bolsonaro.Figures released by the Brazilian space institute, Inpe, on Monday showed at least 11,088 sq km of rainforest was razed between August 2019 and July this year – the highest figure since 2008. Continue reading...

Separated bike lane in Conservative-run borough to be removed after seven weeks

Latest survey finds 75% support for setting net zero by 2030 target for emissions, and 81% support for net zero by 2050Public support for action on climate change is higher now than it was at the peak of the catastrophic bushfires last summer, according to the latest Guardian Essential poll, which shows a strong majority supporting a net zero target by 2050.The latest survey of 1,034 voters has 81% support for the Morrison government adopting a net zero emissions target by 2050 – which is a 10 point increase in the level of voter support for the policy recorded back in January. Continue reading...

More than 300,000 farmers head to capital for ‘decisive battle’ with governmentHundreds of thousands of Indian farmers have marched upon Delhi and set up vast camps blocking entry to the city in protest at agriculture laws they say will destroy livelihoods.More than 300,000 farmers marched from the states of Punjab and Haryana – on foot and in convoys of tractors – at the weekend to reach the Indian capital for what they described as a “decisive battle” with the central government. Continue reading...

Inquest into Ella Kissi-Debrah’s asthma death hears Lewisham council was slow to tackle issueIllegal levels of air pollution in the area where a nine-year-old girl lived and died should have been treated as a public health emergency, an inquest heard.Instead the London borough of Lewisham moved at a “glacial pace” to take steps to address toxic air from traffic where Ella Kissi-Debrah lived and went to primary school, the inquest in south London was told on Monday. Continue reading...

National Trust footage shows animals collecting vegetation to create ‘instant wetland’Beavers have built their first dam in Exmoor in more than 400 years after river restoration work by the National Trust.The semi-aquatic rodents, which constructed the dam at the Holnicote estate near Minehead, are the first to be released into the wild by the trust in its 125-year history. Continue reading...

Environmentalists say firm broke Dutch law by expanding its fossil fuel operationsA court in The Hague will hear claims that Royal Dutch Shell has broken Dutch law by knowingly hampering the global phase-out of fossil fuels, in a case that could force the company to reduce its CO emissions.Lawyers for a consortium led by Friends of the Earth Netherlands will argue on the first of four days of public hearings on Tuesday that Shell has been aware for decades of the damage it has inflicted and is acting unlawfully by expanding its fossil fuel operations. Continue reading...

Letter signed by 100 people including Stephen Fry and Ali Smith points out freedom to roam only extends to 8% of countryMore than 100 authors, musicians, actors and artists have written to Boris Johnson urging him to extend the public’s right to roam over the English countryside.The letter, signed by leading figures from Stephen Fry to Jarvis Cocker, Sir Mark Rylance to Ali Smith, calls on the prime minister to give people greater access to nature to improve the public’s physical and mental health. Continue reading...

Plan to draw up legal definition of ‘ecocide’ attracts support from European countries and small island nationsInternational lawyers are drafting plans for a legally enforceable crime of ecocide – criminalising destruction of the world’s ecosystems – that is already attracting support from European countries and island nations at risk from rising sea levels.The panel coordinating the initiative is chaired by Prof Philippe Sands QC, of University College London, and Florence Mumba, a former judge at the international criminal court (ICC). Continue reading...

European court of human rights case could result in countries being bound to take greater action

New hearing into 2013 death of Ella Kissi-Debrah follows mother’s seven-year fightAn inquest is to consider evidence that illegal levels of air pollution caused the death of a nine-year-old girl, in a landmark legal case.A coroner will be asked to rule that toxic levels of nitrogen dioxide, from the South Circular road in south London, led to the acute asthma attack that killed the primary school pupil, Ella Kissi-Debrah. Her mother, Rosamund, a former teacher, has fought for years for an inquiry into the role of air pollution from traffic in Ella’s death. Continue reading...

Angus Taylor hails data – but experts say much of fall not related to government actionAustralia’s greenhouse gas emissions fell 3% in the year to June due to the Covid-19 shutdown, the ongoing impact of drought and an influx of cheap solar and wind power, according to government figures.The government said it meant Australia had beaten its international 2020 target – widely regarded among experts as an unambitious goal. Continue reading...

Households are now wasting nearly 13% of their groceries and spending more on food delivery services, the Rabobank 2020 Food Waste Report showsAustralians wasted more food during the Covid-19 pandemic, largely thanks to panic buying and food delivery services.The annual bill for the country’s wasteful food choices skyrocketed to an estimated $10.3bn after the coronavirus reached our shores, according to Rabobank’s 2020 Food Waste Report. Continue reading...

£1.6bn subsidies for owning land in England to end, with funds going to improve natureWildlife, nature and the climate will benefit from the biggest shake-up in farming policy in England for 50 years, according to government plans.The £1.6bn subsidy farmers receive every year for simply owning land will be phased out by 2028, with the funds used instead to pay them to restore wild habitats, create new woodlands, boost soils and cut pesticide use. Continue reading...

Angus Taylor’s dire warnings about abandoning coal are going unheeded as the states forge their own path towards renewables

The case for the high speed rail line was heavily dependent on a projected increase in business travelThe case for a complete rethink of public transport priorities in the aftermath of Covid-19 – including a fresh look at arguments for and against the HS2 high speed rail line – is to be the subject of a major parliamentary inquiry beginning this week.The pandemic has led to a dramatic fall in commuting into towns and cities, as well as a national financial crisis highlighted last Wednesday by the chancellor Rishi Sunak in his spending review. Pressure to reduce carbon emissions is also raising questions about the desirability of the £27bn road-building programme. Continue reading...

The tiny freeloaders may be considered disgusting by many but new research shows they are crucial in shaping ecosystemsThe leech craze of the 1800s put parasites on the map. Collectors (usually women and sometimes old horses) would stand in ponds waiting for medicinal leeches to come and suck their blood. They were then picked off and sold for bloodletting.The parasites were so popular that by the early 1900s they were nearly extinct, and there was a coordinated effort to save them. Even so, the European medicinal leech, Hirudo medicinalis, has been labelled as near threatened on the IUCN red list since 1996, and remains one of the few parasites with formal protections. Continue reading...

What would Marx say? Visitor centre and cafe planned for historic London burial ground to capitalise on growing public appetite for genealogy while raising vital funds for upkeep

Analysis: The PM changed tone as soon as Joe Biden was projected likely next US president. Will a policy pivot follow?Scott Morrison’s language about Australia adopting an emissions reduction target of net zero by 2050, and about climate action more generally, is starting to warm up. The recent shift in the prime minister’s language invites two questions: is there a pivot under way, and is the shift real? Continue reading...

Archie Thomas stumbled across solitary windfall fruit that could be cross between cultivated apple and European crab appleA chance find of an apple on a woodland run has led one nature lover to discover a new variety that he hopes to propagate and name.Archie Thomas, who lives in the Nadder valley in Wiltshire, stumbled across a solitary windfall apple on a wooded trackway alongside a large area of ancient woodland near his home this month. Continue reading...

Home owners can get help from government schemes but do they really cut costs?When Graham Davidson and his wife, Pauline, retired to a bungalow in Norfolk three years ago they ripped out the old boiler and replaced it with an air source heat pump at a cost of £10,000. But this pricey replacement has turned into a moneyspinner for the Davidsons – and millions of British households are likely to follow suit in what is expected to be a revolution in home heating.Davidson, 68, who used to work in the car electronics business, says it was financial gain rather than saving the planet that was at the forefront of his decision. But dumping the gas boiler has probably cut his household carbon emissions by more than half. Continue reading...

Exclusive: ACF has been cautioned its charity status prevents it ‘opposing a political candidate’ over letter calling out climate change inactionThe Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission has fired a warning shot at the Australian Conservation Foundation, asking the environment group to “immediately read the guide on political advocacy” and consider withdrawing an open letter of complaint about Angus Taylor’s lack of action on climate change.In correspondence seen by Guardian Australia, the ACNC has expressed objection to a climate change open letter to Scott Morrison published in early November on the ACF’s website. Continue reading...

Deep discounts spark outrage on Twitter as campaigners highlight environmental costClothing retailers have come under fire for selling dresses from just 8p on Black Friday, with critics accusing them of encouraging “fast fashion” and unsustainable consumption.Related: Boohoo hires Sir Brian Leveson to oversee supply chain overhaul Continue reading...

Exclusive: Nationals MP said in 2013 he would sell the property, if he could get the right price, to avoid ‘any viewed conflict of interest’Oil giants Santos and Comet Ridge are again pushing to explore for gas under a licence that covers land owned by Barnaby Joyce, which he said he would sell almost seven years ago, acknowledging it could be perceived as a conflict of interest.In 2013, Joyce was revealed to own land in Gwabegar, near the Pilliga state forest in north-west New South Wales, a region central to the state’s coal seam gas development plans. Continue reading...

Fears nitrogen and phosphorus could be released in large quantities into soil at grave sites

The best of the week’s wildlife pictures from around the world, including desert-dwelling sheep and a plant that has evolved to hide from humans Continue reading...

Scientists fear fur farm animals in wild could create ‘lasting’ Covid reservoir that could then spread back to humansEscaped mink carrying the virus that causes Covid-19 could potentially infect Denmark’s wild animals, raising fears of a permanent Sars-CoV-2 reservoir from which new virus variants could be reintroduced to humans.Denmark, the world’s largest exporter of mink fur, announced in early November that it would cull the country’s farmed mink after discovering a mutated version of the virus that could have jeopardised the efficacy of future vaccines.

With nearly 400,000 crew members trapped at sea by Covid restrictions, it’s time for retailers like Amazon to help press for key worker status

Survey of 600 people finds some parents regret having offspring for same reason

Virus causing ‘high levels of mortality’ in birds, with risk to chickens and other poultryA spate of baffling swan deaths is strongly suspected to be caused by a virulent new strain of avian flu sweeping across Britain.Dying swans were found spinning in circles and discharging blood from their nostrils on Ulverston canal, Cumbria. Swan rescuers have taken in more than 25 dying birds in Worcestershire and nine swans were found dead in Stanley Park, Blackpool. Postmortem examinations have confirmed that six black swans and cygnets that died in Dawlish, Devon, had contracted the latest strain of bird flu, H5N8. Continue reading...

The Coalition plan to hand development approval powers to the states hits a further roadblock after Senate inquiryA Morrison government plan to change Australia’s environment laws to allow development approval powers to be handed to the states has hit a further roadblock, with three key crossbench senators saying in a report they will not support them.The crossbenchers’ opposition means that, together with Labor and the Greens, the Morrison government’s laws would be voted down in the Senate. But one crossbench senator told Guardian Australia he could change his mind once he had seen details in documents that the government has so far withheld. Continue reading...

Amitav Ghosh, Margaret Atwood and Emma Thompson are among 20 activists and cultural figures to speak at Writers Rebel eventWriters and activists including Emma Thompson, Margaret Atwood and Amitav Ghosh are to speak about their favourite endangered animals as part of a remembrance day for lost species.The snow leopard, pangolin and vaquita porpoise are among the endangered animals that will be championed by participants at the free online event, On the Brink, organised by Writers Rebel, which is part of Extinction Rebellion. Continue reading...

Ministers have refused to sign safeguards, potentially spelling disaster for farmers after BrexitMinisters’ pledges to preserve the UK’s food and farming standards after Brexit will not prevent the import of lower-standard products and could spell potential disaster for Britain’s farmers, a report has found.The government has repeatedly promised that a ban on chlorinated chicken and hormone-treated beef would remain in place after Brexit, and has made changes to the way future trade bills will be scrutinised. But ministers have refused to sign safeguards on imported food into law, despite pressure from consumers and civil society groups. Continue reading...

Public accounts committee says ignorance, incompetence and weak oversight to blameThe Nuclear Decommissioning Authority (NDA) has a perpetual lack of knowledge about the state and location of waste on the 17 sites it is responsible for making safe, a powerful committee of MPs has found.This results from decades of poor record keeping and weak government oversight, the MPs said. Combined with a “sorry saga” of incompetence and failure, this has left taxpayers footing the bill for “astronomical sums”, they said. Continue reading...

Industry promotes materialism and lifts sales of climate-harming products, study saysAdvertising needs to be controlled and changed to reduce its impact on the climate, according to a report released as consumers prepare to spend billions on Black Friday.The report by the New Weather Institute thinktank and the charity We are Possible examines how advertising indirectly contributes to climate change and the ecological emergency. Continue reading...

Long-running investigation found state’s conduct on the basin was flawed, but not corruptA long-running investigation into New South Wales’ management of water in the Murray-Darling basin has not found any corrupt conduct but has concluded the state’s water policies were undermined for a decade by departmental favouring of the irrigation industry.In two related investigations known as Operation Avon and Operation Mezzo, the Independent Commission Against Corruption (Icac) examined multiple allegations, over almost a decade, concerning complaints of corruption involving the management of water, particularly in the Barwon-Darling area of the Murray-Darling Basin. Continue reading...

Regulation will help prevent deaths of 1m waterbirds by lead poisoning every yearLead shot is to be banned from all wetlands in the European Union, in a decision that is expected to pave the way for phasing out all toxic ammunition.The European parliament voted against objections lodged by far-right parties, allowing the European commission to introduce the new regulations by the end of the year. Continue reading...

Scottish environment minister said self-regulation by grouse shooting industry had failedScottish grouse moors will be controlled by a strict licensing regime after the industry failed to combat the illegal persecution of birds of prey, the Scottish government has announced.Mairi Gougeon, an environment minister, said work on drafting new legislation would start immediately, several years earlier than recommended by an expert review into the regulation of grouse moors led by Prof Alan Werritty last year. Continue reading...

Processing plant on a Papua New Guinean island may bring more commercial pressure on fisheries in areas where regulation is uncertainA $200m Chinese-built fishery plant planned for a Papua New Guinean island could allow Chinese-backed commercial vessels to fish legally in the Torres Strait, and has raised concerns about unregulated fishing in the same waters, potentially threatening the Australian industry and local PNG fishers.China’s ministry of commerce this month announced a $527m kina (A$204m) deal to establish a “comprehensive multi-functional fishery industrial park” project on Daru Island, in PNG’s Western Province. Continue reading...