On November 12, the protest at the COP30 Climate Summit — a space where world leaders gather to negotiate but rarely deliver — was as vivid as it was defiant.. Indigenous activists, students, and workers bypassed security and stormed the summit: chanting and waving banners, refusing to go unheard in their demands for change. “We can’t eat money,” protested Gilmar, a Tupinambá Indigenous man from present-day Brazil.
Within these four simple words lies the central tension of our age: why do those in power preach endless economic growth when it is that very growth driving us toward extinction?
Of course, it is not only the Tupinambá, or other Brazilian activists, who want to see climate justice.
Their anger reflects a frustration shared by masses of people around the world. This anger will soon be on display here, on the East coast of NSW: this weekend, thousands will gather on Awabakal land for the People’s Blockade, a mass action led by Rising Tide that will bring the Port of Newcastle’s exports to a halt. The Port of Newcastle isn’t just another industrial site — it’s the largest coal exporter in the world. In 2024, it shipped 149.9 million tonnes of coal, accounting for roughly 15% of all coal transported globally by sea.
The need to tackle climate change has been recognised for decades by both Labor and Liberal governments (and fossil fuel companies themselves), despite such action laying in stark opposition to their profit-fuelled motives. Though, they have persistently asserted the importance of “balancing” this with “responsible economic management”.
The ongoing, large-scale climate damage facilitated by the Port of Newcastle, and the Australian fossil fuel industry more broadly, is the material result of this feeble attempt at “balance”.
This supposed “balance” has, in practice, meant approving new coal mines across the country, authorising the destruction of Indigenous cultural sites, and directing public subsidies toward fossil fuel companies. It is a contradiction that speaks for itself.
The cynical nature of the government’s false-promises is particularly visible in the political climate of the present-day. In their current term, the Labor government under Anthony Albanese has approved 32 coal, oil, and gas projects that will see more than 13 million tonnes of CO^2 emissions by 2035. Meanwhile, Sussan Ley recently announced that the Liberal Party, in alignment with their coalition counterpart The Nationals, have committed to scrapping net-zero emissions from their policy platform.
On these facts, it seems governmental climate promises will always be empty… talk is cheap!
That’s why the November 28 People’s Blockade matters. It’s not symbolic. It’s a material disruption of a system that’s killing us, and it’s thousands of everyday people who refuse to let our profit-driven and coal-addicted rulers’ fantasies of “responsible economic management” decide the fate of our planet.
History has taught us that these rulers are not benevolent, and that they do not make concessions until masses of ordinary people unite to force their hand. If you’re tired of watching and waiting while the same excuses are repeated, you’re not alone. Change has never come from passivity. Our future isn’t something to wait for — it’s something we have to actively defend.
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