Questions posed by our Group.

On Friday 28 May the Justice & Peace Group was very pleased to have the opportunity of meeting virtually with Mr Gagan Mohindra, MP for South West Hertfordshire, which includes Tring. We were very grateful to him for giving his time to meet with us and to address the questions we put to him about relief of poverty and climate change – world issues which the Justice & Peace Group believe are opportune to pursue at this time given the G7 meeting in June and COP26 in November. Our government has a great opportunity as host of both meetings to influence world governments to behave in a way which would be of enormous benefit to the world and everyone within it.

Following discussions among members of the J&P Group it was agreed that three questions should be put to our MP. After each of the questions were posed by the Group Secretary, Michael Demidecki, Mr Mohindra responded. After each response there were supplementary questions, so the meeting took the form of a discussion.

The three questions were:

Question 1. 150 million people are set to fall into extreme poverty as a result of the pandemic. But instead of increasing support to fight global poverty and support the global recovery, the UK government is slashing the aid budget this year. With 2021 being the year that the UK has a leadership role to play on the global stage, we are saddened to see Britain turning its back on the world like this. Will you support our calls to increase the quantity and quality of UK spending on overseas aid?

Question 2. Pope Francis has been clear in his calls for debt cancellation and the head of the World Bank has said that more debt cancellation is essential for low-income countries. We know that cancelling debts is the easiest way to allow poorer countries to recover from the pandemic. Will you support our calls for full debt cancellation for low-income countries that need it?

Question 3: Millions of our sisters and brothers worldwide are already facing the reality of the climate crisis, with homes, livelihoods and loved ones at risk from more frequent and more severe storms, floods and droughts. Yet it is the world’s richest countries, including the UK, who bear the greatest responsibility for the greenhouse gas emissions driving temperature rises. What will you do to ensure that our government takes the climate crisis seriously at COP26 and that an agreement is reached that ensures we stay within 1.5 degrees of global average warming?

Responses and the discussion that followed will be published in Comment, the magazine of the churches in Tring. After publication the full article will be carried on the website.