The UN climate change summit expected to take place in Glasgow in November 2020 has been postponed to 2021, due to the coronavirus. The 26th conference of parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change had been expected to attract 30,000 delegates and 190 heads of government, co-hosted by the governments of the U.K. and Italy.

While the announcement may have become inevitable, given the Covid 19 pandemic and the many responsibilities of all the governments dealing with it, climate change represents its own kind of emergency, and the continued upward trend of emissions before the virus outbreak halted so much economic activity demanded urgent action. All signatories of the Paris Agreement on Climate Change are due to update their Nationally Determined Contributions and to set out their ambitions for tackling climate change.

We should not leave it to children's school strikes and street protests to address climate change. It needs to remain an urgent priority of all governments, and our own government needs to use the time to make the postponed conference of parties a fully effective step on the way to achieving net zero emissions, as Alok Sharma has now promised