Sir David Attenborough tells MPs drastic action is needed to save the planet 

Sir David Attenborough told today how two trips to the Great Barrier Reef 60 years apart revealed the full horror of climate change as he told MPs Britain started global warming so must lead the global fight against it. 

When visiting the Australian landmark in 1957 he had ‘the extraordinary experience of diving on the reef and suddenly seeing this multitude of fantastic beautiful forms of life.’

But of returning in 2015, he said: ‘Instead of multitudes of wonderful forms of life I was struck by how it was bleached white because of the rising temperatures and increasing acidity of the seas’.

Sir David visiting the Great Barrier Reef in the 1950s (left) and on another visit 10 years ago (right) when he saw how much of the coral had been bleached 

Sir David said the UK’s record on tackling climate change ‘is pretty good’, but that should be the case because it kicked off the Industrial Revolution. 

‘Who started the problem? This country,’ he said. ‘It was the Industrial Revolution which started here, and what was the industrial revolution, it was based on burning coal.

‘As it was us who started the problems, and if we are now taking a lead in solving the problem that only the right and responsible thing to do.’

Quizzed on whether the UK’s new legal ‘net zero’ target for 2050 was sufficient or whether calls from campaigners for a 2025 goal was realistic, Sir David said: ‘you can’t be radical enough in deal with issues at the moment.’

‘The question is what is practically possible, and how can we take the electorate with us in dealing with these problems. Dealing with problems means we’ve got to change our lifestyle.’

‘The electorate of tomorrow are already making their voices very clear, that’s a source of great comfort.’

Sir David was speaking to Parliament’s Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee.

The legendary broadcaster warned global warming would cause ‘great social unrest’ and suffering.

‘I’m not by nature a propagandist’, he said ‘[but] if you become aware of what is happening you don’t have any alternative. 

‘The problems in the next thirty years are going to cause great social unrest and change the way we live.’   

Sir David said the most vivid example he has seen of the changing climate was revisiting the Great Barrier Reef and seeing how it had bleached because of rising temperatures

Sir David said he did not talk about climate change when he started in natural history because ‘we didn’t know, I didn’t believe we could change the climate, or worse the changes we were going to inflict were irreversible, which they are if we go on as we are.’

He said the voices of ‘disbelief’ on climate change should not be stamped out and it was important that they should be heard in public.

But the presenter added: ‘I’m sorry there are people who are in power internationally, notably of course the US, but also Australia, which is extraordinary because Australia is having to deal with some of the most extreme manifestations of climate change, and these voices are already heard.

‘One hopes the electorate will respond to that.’

Sir Davis said public attitudes towards the environment had been ‘transformed’ – drawing a parallel to changing attitudes to slavery in the 19th century. 

On the issue of plastic, he said: ‘I’ve been going on about plastics for 20 years. Anybody who swims know that, or anyone who travels can see, the horrors of what plastic pollution can do.

‘I’ve been putting it in programmes for years, and nobody took any notice’.

Then a two-minute clip in his programme Blue Planet II ‘rang a bell with people’, he added.  

Sir David was speaking to Parliament’s Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy Committee