Photo of the Solent- Credit: HLD Media
Even though Volunteers’ Week 2023 has come to an end, we don’t have to stop celebrating the people who use their free time to make an impact in their communities and make Save the Children’s work possible.
As a member of The Climate Coalition, Save the Children UK is taking part of Great Big Green Week 2023 (which runs from the 10th-18th of June)- the UK’s biggest celebration of community action to tackle climate change and protect nature.
We launched our ‘Children and Young People Climate Fund’ which has given out 11 micro-grants to youth-led community and grassroots organisations to organise local events and activities during Great Big Green Week.
The Youth Cabinet at Portsmouth City Council is one of our grantees- made up of 11-19 year olds from across the city- the Cabinet is running a campaign called Save our Solent.
Meet Jiali, one of the Cabinet’s members.
The Portsmouth Youth Cabinet have been planning a national climate campaign for months now, and thanks to a grant we received from Save the Children, we’re finally able to bring it to life.
We are a group of 11-19 year old volunteers who seek to represent all young people in the City of Portsmouth and amplify their voices to drive positive change because we believe that an active and connected student voice will meaningfully influence decision making and in turn enhance young people flourishing across the city.
Portsmouth is a coastal city, so it is our job as citizens and leaders to protect its sea life. And yet, companies like Southern Water plead guilty to dumping billions of litres of sewage into our ocean and continue to do so, all the while making millions of pounds in profit! Sewage is not only fatal to wildlife, it’s a hazard to human health. Who wants to go for a swim knowing that you're drenching yourself in other people’s faeces (and maybe even yours!) as well as infectious bacteria and viruses?
So we are campaigning. And the campaign is called, “Save our Solent” (or “SOS” for short). The aim is to raise awareness of the impacts of changing climates on our marine environments, and to encourage our local waste facility to supply water butts to households in order to reduce local flooding and water entering the wastewater network. I know some people will see the words “water butt” and laugh, but a trial in the Isle of Wight showed that this one small measure reduced sewage spills caused by storm overflows by 70%! To kickstart this movement, we’ll be showing our campaign video at Final Straw’s eco conference on 13th June 2023, coinciding with Great Big Green Week.
We are in a crisis. And leaders fail to see that, letting cash and profit muddy the path to justice. As young people, it’s our future that will suffer. Does that mean it is also our responsibility to initiate change? Of course not! Children and teenagers should not be expected, on top of everything else we’re expected of (passing exams, maintaining a healthy social and academic balance, and deciding the entire trajectory of our lives), to also solve the world’s problems when we played no part in making them. It should be the adults’ responsibility. But nothing seems to get done when us kids sit idly by the side. And with issues like climate change, inequality, poverty, famine, political unrest, and restriction of human rights continuing to prevail in our world, we are forced to act. And it is imperative that we do. Let’s rise up taller than our elders and become the shoulders which the world can rest upon.
If you want to find out more about Great Big Green Week and see what’s going on where you live, check out the official website here. From sharing what inspires you to fight climate change, to writing a Letter to Tomorrow which will urge politicians to action, there are plenty of ways that you can get involved.
