We the people of Australia demand that our Prime Minister doesn’t make us look like the laughing stock of the world, by leaving his seat empty at COP26 - the United Nation's major Climate Summit. What a complete disgrace that would be! What a disservice to the people of this great country and the world at large, for we are all global citizens and we all need to play our part. The most important major Climate Summit held by the United Nations to date and Scott Morrison has the audacity to think that he can choose whether or not he'll even attend? Well here’s the thing. Enough is enough!!!!

Scott Morrison, the honourable Prime Minister of Australia, with all due respect… THIS IS YOUR JOB! But it seems you need some serious reminding of this fact. Here it is – you don’t actually get a say in whether you’ll attend, we the people do. We, the citizens of Australia do, our children do and our children’s children et all. Representing Australia on the global stage is a pretty big part of your job description, you don’t get to just choose to attend the summits you like, you attend them all, especially one as important as this. It’s beyond farcical that you would even debate this, especially when a no-show would seriously jeopardise Australia’s already laughable reputation on climate commitments.

We, the people of Australia demand that our Prime Minister takes his role as leader of this country seriously and properly represents us on the world stage as the country that wants to be a team player and also one that is serious about being part of the solution. The Prime Minister of Australia works for us, NOT for their party. After all, why does an environmentally divided political party get to decide that their beliefs are more important than the people’s majority? This issue needs to be seriously addressed in this country. Just because the Liberal National Party are bitterly divided on whether there is even a climate crisis at all, should never have been allowed to become the collective problem of all Australians and in turn subject us all to complete disillusionment and inaction on the greatest threat to humankind and this beautiful planet that we are so privileged to call home. There is no planet B, so there is no alternative but to protect all life on earth with everything we have and to stand up and make our voices heard.  
 
Australians have been doing exactly this for years now through record breaking multi-city climate change protests and petitions all over our land. Throughout it all, the Liberal National Party has merely subjected Australians to an endless loop of “blah blah blah” in response – as Greta Thunberg so rightly pointed out in her dressing down of world leaders in her latest speech at the Youth4Climate Summit in Milan. Both political parties in this country have argued, stonewalled, played point scoring games, ignored the science, re-worked the math, denied and flat out refused to accept that real climate action is desperately needed and a huge overhaul in Australia’s energy sector is required in order to drastically reduce our emissions.

Too many years, decades in fact, have been wasted on childish arguments between the privileged few in our political parties who are unwilling to see red and this blatant, reprehensible inaction has led to countless squandered opportunities – not least, robbing Australia of the chance to become the world leader in clean energy. Australia should be authentically meeting and even far exceeding global emission reduction targets if this government was doing its job. How much more precious time are we going to give these politicians who are supposed to be representing US? How much more? We can’t afford any more, neither can the planet. The clock’s stopped ticking on your little game Mr Morrison, you don’t get to sit this one out.  

Natasha Kassam, director the Lowy Institute's Public Opinion and Foreign Policy Program said "Nine in 10 Australians agree that climate change is an issue and we need to do something about it. She also said “The majority say that our climate change position is bad for our reputation and 70 per cent of Australians say that we should join with other countries such as UK and US to increase our commitments to address climate change.”
 
The people have called it Scott and it’s your job to act on the people’s wishes. Get on that private jet and take your seat at COP26 in Glasgow. Australians have spoken and we expect you to take action - so join the UN’s table and dutifully carry the burden that all countries need to share, individually and collectively.

Please sign this petition if you agree. Please share it far and wide on your social channels. Please chip in and help it reach more eyes and ears. Please don’t waste another opportunity to demand better for Australia and our beautiful planet. Thank you!