A group of environmental activists have painted the town blue as part of a protest against Glasgow City Council.
Extinction Rebellion Glasgow, an international movement calling for urgent action in the face of catastrophic climate change, marched towards Glasgow city chambers with painted blue feet to highlight the council's decision not to declare a climate emergency across the city.
Activists with blue paint on their shoes or feet left footprints up to the entrance of the chambers after blocking traffic on the street in front with a banner that read: “We delay you for 5 minutes. The government has delayed for 30 years. Declare a climate emergency.”
Extinction Rebellion hope to show through their footprints that public space can be reclaimed as a place of popular creativity, where people can come together to announce and work through the collective hazards they face.
An Extinction Rebellion Glasgow spokesperson said: “Our footprints denounce the secrecy, lies and shallow morality of our local government.
"Glasgow, its streets and our passage through them, will eventually be flooded because of the inaction of politicians.
READ MORE: Glasgow to be hit by sit ins and disruption planned by climate protestors
Solidarity begins when you realise the state has forgotten you and capital has forgotten everything.
— Extinction Rebellion Scotland (@ScotlandXr) March 21, 2019
Today #ExtinctionRebellion Glasgow walked blue footprints across George Square to the council City Chambers, to protest their failure to declare #ClimateEmergency pic.twitter.com/gpbQO491BA
"Our aim is to directly confront the council, assigning responsibility for flood damage not onto individuals, but onto our system of corporate bought governance that needs to be dismantled and recreated to protect our common future.
“Our governments serve the interests of fossil-fuel companies, not the people; who they not only fails to represent, but, during our era of coalescing crises (ecological, austerity, anti-migrant), fail to keep alive. When people's lives are not taken seriously, authority should not be either.”
Our blue footprints symbolise both the necessity of taking to the streets to demand radical action and the dangers Glasgow and the Clyde region face due to sea-level rise. 🌊
— Extinction Rebellion Scotland (@ScotlandXr) March 21, 2019
The action is part of a strategy of civil disobedience that aims to pressure Glasgow City Council into declaring a climate emergency.
The "Blue Footprints" action follows The Blue Wave protest of 2nd March 2019, when around two hundred citizens symbolised the disruption of flooding by marching from the river Clyde, up main streets, through shopping centres and stopping traffic before gathering in George Square.
READ MORE: Extinction Rebellion lead march to George Square
The group, which also has hundreds of branches worldwide, has demanded that government admit the truth about the ecological emergency, reverse all policies inconsistent with addressing climate change, and work alongside the media to communicate with citizens.
They also feel legally binding policy measures to reduce carbon emissions to net zero by 2025 and to reduce consumption levels should be put in place immediately.
A spokesman for Glasgow City Council said: "The council has already established a Climate Emergency Working Group – which the Extinction Rebellion protestors sit on.
“That is a clear recognition of the seriousness with which it approaches the recent IPCC report and an acknowledgement of the enormity of the potential risks facing Glasgow and the wider Clyde Valley area as a consequence of climate change.
“Given that, it’s extremely hard to see what is achieved by daubing streets and buildings with paint, beyond the city having to pay to clear it up.”
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