Protecting the environment

This is Humanists UK’s policy on the environment. But we also play host to Humanist Climate Action, a volunteer-led network of Humanists UK members and supporters committed to redefining lifestyles and campaigning for policies that promote low-carbon, ethical, and sustainable living in the light of the degeneration of the Earth’s climate and biodiversity. It has its own aims and policy.

Policy summary

Problem:
We are experiencing a climate crisis and biodiversity loss, which is bad for humanity and for other animals.

Consequences:
Human-caused climate change is already intensifying heat waves, floods, droughts, and sea-level rise, damaging health, homes and livelihoods; in parallel, human-driven nature loss is accelerating, undermining food, water, and wellbeing for us and for animals.

Our policy:
We support evidence-based policies to deal with the climate crisis, loss of biodiversity, and other environmental problems that will be calculated to increase the welfare and happiness of human beings and of other animals in sustainable ways.

Recommendation:
The UK Government must act in line with the scientific consensus by delivering sustained cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, protecting and restoring ecosystems, and facilitating a fair transition to a green economy.

Human beings are part of a wider natural world that must be treated sustainably for the sake of current and future generations.

We give philosophical and practical support to significant initiatives to meet global challenges, showing how these initiatives rest on our principles of accepting scientific evidence, acknowledging human responsibility, promoting happiness for all, and reducing harm. We are a signatory of Humanists International’s Reykjavik Declaration on the Climate Change Crisis, which spells out the urgent need for all people to take action on climate change.

Our volunteer-led network, Humanist Climate Action, campaigns for policies that promote low-carbon, ethical, and sustainable living in the light of the degeneration of the Earth’s climate and biodiversity.

In depth

Humanists have a long tradition of recognising that we are part of the natural world, shaped by evolution and interdependent with other living things. This naturalistic outlook makes environmental protection a humanist concern. Climate change and biodiversity loss directly affect the health, wellbeing, and security of human and other animal life on this planet.

Our commitment to tackling the climate crisis flows from core humanist principles: reliance on scientific evidence, acceptance of human responsibility, and the moral imperative to promote happiness and reduce harm. We cannot look to higher powers to solve these problems for us. We must act with reason and compassion. For humanists, protecting the environment is not separate from our values but a necessary extension of them.

What we’re doing

The Reykjavik Declaration commits us to fostering ‘a social and political commitment to urgent action and long-term policymaking to mitigate and prevent climate change.’ We achieve this by supporting or initiating joint statements or other lawful activities with other organisations, including religious groups where appropriate, in line with the Reykjavik Declaration.

This includes maintaining our corporate membership of the Climate Coalition and Climate Cymru, and responding to the Coalition’s calls for joint action. Our sister charity, Humanist Society Scotland, also campaigns against climate change, including through being a member of Stop Climate Chaos Scotland.

We include resources on humanist support for environmental action in our resources for schools.

We also provide administrative support to Humanist Climate Action. Its aims are:

To promote environmentally friendly policies, and to endorse and support the actions of other environmental campaigning groups that have similar objectives.
To promote rational dialogue and debate about the causes of the climate and environmental crises and how to tackle them.
To encourage humanists to promote environmentally friendly policies, and adopt greener lifestyles, following the best available scientific evidence.
To ensure that the humanist voice is heard in initiatives on environmental issues led by religion or belief organisations.

We also make sure that, as an organisation, we take responsibility for minimising our environmental impact. In particular:

Staff contracts and volunteer agreements include a commitment to following the environmental policy in our Staff Handbook. The environmental policy and practices are included in the induction of new staff.
We will encourage and support our networks to reduce their environmental impact.
We will observe existing environmental legislation as a minimum standard.
We seek to reduce unnecessary travel, and to make necessary travel as sustainable as possible.
When tendering, we ask potential suppliers for their environmental policies and for evidence of implementation of such policies and indicate that such performance will be used as criteria for supplier selection.
We will continue undertaking bi-annual audits of our carbon footprint and regularly seek to reduce it.