20150902_NN

Source: BBC TV: Newsnight

URL: N/A

Date: 02/09/2015

Event: Emma Thompson: "our temperature will rise 4 degrees Celsius by 2030"

Credit: BBC TV

People:

• Emily Maitlis: BBC journalist and newsreader
• Emma Thompson: Hollywood actress and climate campaigner

Emily Maitlis: Well, one voice unambiguous in her support of this country bringing in more refugees is the actress Emma Thompson, whose own adopted son was a refugee from Rwanda. She was up at 4 o'clock this morning, helping bring life to a giant polar bear, Aurora, which she and some 60 other Greenpeace campaigners took to the Shell Centre on London's South Bank to protest against Arctic drilling. I caught up with her earlier and asked whether she believed she could negotiate with the oil giant.

Emma Thompson: No, because we've been negotiating with Shell for years, and there's been so much obfuscation and so many lies, actually, and so much greenwash. They've absolutely put lip service to - "Yes, yes, we're interested in renewables, yes, yes, yes", but they've continued without cessation to extract, and they've continued their plans to drill in the Arctic. They have plans to drill until 2030, and if they take out of the earth all the oil they want to take out, you look at the science - our temperature will rise 4 degrees Celsius by 2030, and that's not sustainable.

Emily Maitlis: Is there a path for you straight to the President of the US?

Emma Thompson: Well, I could try ringing him... I suppose. But I don't think that that would help. I think that successive governments, including his, have been too much in the pockets of the big oil companies. Um, I think it's very difficult for governments to break away from that.

Emily Maitlis: Would it be useful for you, on a matter of - the Arctic, for example, to get yourself arrested? Does that sound useful?

Emma Thompson: It depends. I suppose it - I mean, today I would have been, I suppose, a good news story for Greenpeace, and arrests are useful to them. I could just hear the sort of distant sound of all the PR people in the Shell offices in the big buildings, going "Don't arrest her, do not arrest the big mouth! Please don't ev- don't do that!" So they didn't.

Emily Maitlis: How do you choose? I mean, there will be people watching this, saying "There are currently thousands of people drowning in the Mediterranean - what odd timing, to go and talk about Arctic and oil and the environment -"

Emma Thompson: Mm.

Emily Maitlis: - "um, as opposed to, you know, about what Britain has to do about the refugee crisis".

Emma Thompson: I'm really glad that you brought that up, because of course it's profoundly connected. Our refugee crisis - which, let me tell you, if we allow climate change to go on as it's going, the refugee crisis we have at the moment will look like a tea party, compared to what's going to happen in a few years' time. Because if we allow climate change to continue, there are going to be entire swathes of the Earth that will become uninhabitable, and where are those people going to go? Where do we think they're going to go? We're looking at a humanitarian disaster of proportions we simply can't imagine.

Emily Maitlis: So is that still the answer to the refugees drowning in the Mediterranean today, this week?

Emma Thompson: Today, this week, the answer to the refugees drowning in the Mediterranean is not that, no, it's to do with bringing in - we have to open our doors, certainly, to more refugees. The idea of 3,000 people in Calais, who've been through unspeakable things - um, it makes me feel very ashamed.

Emily Maitlis: So why do you think we're not doing it? This time round, I mean, you've got Germany, who seems to be opening its doors, and you've got -

Emma Thompson: 800,000.

Emily Maitlis: - the UK, that isn't.

Emma Thompson: No, it's not good enough. And also we're not even meeting our quotas, that's really shaming. Um, so I think it's got a lot to do with racism. I think if these people were white Europeans that were coming from some dictatorship in Bosnia or somewhere, where if they were coming, turning up, we would feel quite differently about it, and I think that it is the mark of a civilised and a skillful and humane society - and I use the word "skillful" advisedly, because we're so unskilled in our responses to strangers on our shores.

Emily Maitlis: Who needs to be the powerful voice that says, um, what's happening now is not working?

Emma Thompson: Well, you know, it's a very good question, I mean, I would hope that there were statesmen and women out there with the kind of, um, sense of decency, of common humanity, out there, who would find it possible and indeed incumbent upon them to stand up and say "We need to help these people. They're not just coming over here because they want an easy ride. They've been through hell - there's 3,000 of them in Calais. That's nothing! We've got plenty of room for them".

Emily Maitlis: You're on record as being a Labour supporter. Clearly your heart is with a lot of green issues - is this a moment where you feel more pulled towards the Labour Party than the Green Party?

Emma Thompson: I'm very torn, I mean, the Labour Party have been... useless, actually, on green issues, but I think Corbyn's quite - quite sound on them. We can't open the mines again, sorry about that, but it's the dirtiest energy there is. Um, but I think he is very sound and that he would be very intelligent and face - he would be willing to face the transition that we're all going to have to face.

Emily Maitlis: And do you think Labour could get into power with Jeremy Corbyn?

Emma Thompson: Um... yeah... I do.

Emily Maitlis: Emma Thompson, speaking to me earlier.