Dr Danny Chambers MP: Climate Change Threatens UK Food Security and National Safety

​Liberal Democrat MP Dr Danny Chambers has issued a stark warning that climate change poses a direct and immediate threat to the United Kingdom's national security through its severe impact on agriculture and food production.

​Speaking in Parliament following a tumultuous period of extreme weather, Dr Chambers highlighted the compounding pressures facing British food producers. "We know that food security is part of national security and it's been another tough year for agriculture, a record wet winter and now a record hot summer," Dr Danny Chambers 

​The Liberal Democrat MP pointed to the shifting geographic range of agricultural diseases as a tangible consequence of rising global temperatures. Highlighting the arrival of bluetongue virus, he noted, "We also have blue tongue disease going through livestock, which when I was at vet school was a disease of Northern Africa and Southern Europe and it has spread through Europe to the UK and now to Scotland because of climate change."

​Dr Danny Chambers stressed that the unfolding crisis must be treated with utmost urgency rather than treated as a distant theoretical concept. "After a summer of heatwaves, drought, wildfires and disease outbreaks, I raised climate change in Parliament today because this is not some abstract environmental debate," "It is about food security. It is about whether British farmers can keep producing the food we rely on as extreme weather becomes more common, crops come under greater pressure and changing temperatures increase the risk of animal and plant diseases."

​Calling for a dual approach of mitigation and adaptation, Dr Danny Chambers argued, "We need to do two things at once: take serious action to tackle climate change, and prepare properly for the impacts that are already happening and those we know are coming."

​In his parliamentary address, the MP also turned his criticism toward the political opposition, taking aim at reported candidate vetting rules. "The Conservatives are now banning people from standing as Conservative candidates at the next General Election if they support serious action to tackle climate change." "Yet instead of facing up to that reality, the Conservatives are banning prospective MPs from standing for the party if they believe Britain should take serious action."

​Challenging the political establishment to align itself with empirical evidence, Dr Danny Chambers concluded, "We need politicians who follow the science, understand the risks and are prepared to act on them. The Conservatives have simply left the field when it comes to environmental credibility. It is scientifically ignorant, economically reckless and deeply irresponsible." 

Directing his final inquiry to the Foreign Secretary on the floor of the House, he asked, "Does the Foreign Secretary agree with me that it is hugely irresponsible and it is scientifically ignorant for the Leader of the Opposition to ban Conservative candidates standing at the next general election if they believe in taking serious action to tackle climate change?"