Climate change is a more important issue than coronavirus, Brexit or Scottish independence. It's time to start taking it seriously – Kenny MacAskill MP

As searing heat and life-threatening floods become more common, we need to wake up to the fact that humanity is doomed unless we take action to address global warming, writes Kenny MacAskill MP
People gather for a photo in front of an unofficial thermometer at Furnace Creek Visitor Centre in Death Valley National Park, California. Park visitors were warned to travel 'prepared to survive'. (Picture: Mario Tama/Getty Images)People gather for a photo in front of an unofficial thermometer at Furnace Creek Visitor Centre in Death Valley National Park, California. Park visitors were warned to travel 'prepared to survive'. (Picture: Mario Tama/Getty Images)
People gather for a photo in front of an unofficial thermometer at Furnace Creek Visitor Centre in Death Valley National Park, California. Park visitors were warned to travel 'prepared to survive'. (Picture: Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Planet Earth endured its hottest day, with a temperature of 130 degrees Fahrenheit or 54.4 degree Celsius recorded in California’s Death Valley. Now that’s an inhospitable place where no one lives at the best of times and only hardy travellers venture through. But it’s indicative of a global warming and we should all be afraid, very afraid.

We might not have experienced that temperature here, but we’ve suffered from global warming all the same. Our warmer and wetter climate has seen us go from balmy weather to torrential rain just this week. The tragedy that befell the train from Aberdeen and took the lives of three people testifies to that.

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It’s here to stay and we’ll need to get used to it. But worse will happen both here and elsewhere if we don’t change our ways. There’ll be areas that are currently inhabited where life will simply become intolerable due to heat. They’re not remote regions but densely populated areas including places like Texas.

Other parts will face flooding and sea-level rises which will result in cities and entire regions requiring to be abandoned. They too aren’t isolated parts but include packed areas such as southern Bangladesh, Florida and even capital cities like Jakarta.

We really have to wake up and smell the coffee. Coronavirus is bad but climate change is even worse. Any political debate, whether about independence or Brexit, will be irrelevant, if our land is blighted and our planet doomed.

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