Climate change activist Greta Thunberg, 16, calls for first general strike in almost 100 years in a bid to force leaders to act over ‘existential crisis’
- Schoolgirl’s protest led to children around the world skipping school inn ‘strike’
- She came to Britain last week to support Extinction Rebellion action in London
- Now she’s called for a general strike in the UK over the threat of climate change
The Swedish schoolgirl behind the children’s global warming school boycott is now calling for adults to join them in a general strike.
Greta Thunberg is the 16-year-old whose refusal to go to school because of climate change led to children around the world skipping classes to protest.
She came to Britain last week and spoke to the activists camping out in Marble Arch and causing chaos to London’s transport networks.
Teenage climate change activist Greta Thunberg has called for a general strike in the UK
Today, Greta will visit the House of Commons to speak to Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and environment minister Michael Gove.
Speaking at an event in London yesterday, she called on the UK to hold a general strike over climate change.
The schoolgirl then told Radio 4’s Today programme this morning that there needs to be ‘a level of panic’ over climate change.
She added: ‘If your house is on fire then that does require some level of panic.
‘You don’t sit talking about insurance claims and rebuilding – you do everything you can to put out the fire.’
The Nobel Peace Prize nominee is also expected to meet the leaders at around 11.30am on Tuesday before giving a speech at a meeting in Portcullis House at around 2pm.
Greta called for a General Strike over climate change at an event in London yesterday
Six months ago, the then-unknown Miss Thunberg camped outside Sweden’s parliament next to a hand-written sign that read ‘Skolstrejk för Klimatet’ (School strike for the climate).
She skipped school every Friday to sit on the steps of the Riksdag and soon became a global success following her first TED talk – which now has more than a million views.
But questions have been raised over whether the teenager’s rise to global fame is actually a carefully laid out public relations campaign.
The school strike coincided with the launch of a book about climate change written by her mother, well known opera singer Malena Ernman, according to Swiss magazine Die Weltwoche.
Miss Thunberg denied that the book launch had anything to do with her personal school strike.