Liberal friends,

As you might have gathered from our social media outlets I have been chosen to be the Chairperson of the Climate Justice Committee (CJC) until Liberal International’s (LI) upcoming Congress.

It is an honour to be working on this committee and an even greater honour to be for now its chairperson.

As the four words above states “The Planet Cannot Wait” we need to get on with real and substantial goals in order to reverse the damage that we are doing to the Planet.

For this we liberals via the LI CJC will be working towards having general principles and achievable goals which we will disseminate to all our liberal partners around the world.

Our main focus for now is to prepare a programme to present at COP26 in Glasgow. We intend to call upon all our global liberal partners to participate in leading on environmental policies which will achieve the decarbonisation of the Planet as soon as possible.

We will be working at encouraging and supporting were necessary all liberal governments around the globe to engage with the Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) under the Paris Agreement. For those liberal partners who are in opposition to be able to understand the concept to be in a position to monitor their governments progress on this issue.

All economies around the world have taken a big hit due to the COVID29 pandemic and it is now more than ever that the environment is placed at the core of any recovery programme or economic diversification plan.

Therefore, in COP 26 the liberal family should be seen as leading the way on the environment and we should be bold and ambitious. Our global liberal network is the tool we intend to use in order to work together to achieve our ambitious goals.

The future of our children and our children’s children is in our hands and we should not be the ones to shy away and deny this to them by leaving a world where climate change devastates the planet and de-facto their prospect of achieving reasonable goals.

I would like to take this opportunity to welcome Andrea Ugrinoska who has recently joined our team at the LI Secretariat who will be working directly with the CJC to fulfil our Goals. To also welcome Susanna Rivero Baughman who is now the Deputy Chairperson of the CJC.

Thank you to Dr Hakima el Haité, our LI President, in placing confidence in proposing us to lead the CJC. And last but certainly not least thanks to the members of the CJC who unanimously approved us to lead this extremely important committee.

I am really looking forward in working together with you all.

Yours Sincerely

Steven Linares