Online on Teams (please note that the meeting link will be sent in an email to all attendees before the event)
Join Roz Foyer, STUC General Secretary; Lilian Macer, Unison Scotland Convenor, and the Adaptation Scotland programme for this online webinar to launch new resources to help identify climate hazards and improve resilience in Scotland’s workplaces.
Responding to the climate emergency requires a rapid transition to net zero, but it also needs us to adapt to the unavoidable impacts of climate change on temperature, rainfall, sea level rise and extreme weather events. All workers whether they work indoors, outdoors, offshore or travel for a living are increasingly vulnerable to disruption, damage, and potential injury from climate change impacts such as windstorms, flooding, and heatwaves.
Over the last year Adaptation Scotland and the Scottish Trade Union movement have worked together to co-create resources to help trade union workplace reps, workers, and employers to identify the hazards that climate change impacts could bring to a range of different workplaces.
The resources combine the latest climate change science and the lived experience of trade union representatives from across Scotland, which suggests that climate change impacts, without adaptation, threaten health and safety. However, well planned adaptation action to increase climate resilience can also address other workplace challenges; and deliver a wide range of co-benefits for physical and mental wellbeing, productivity, welfare, and nature. Such action can transform our poorest communities and present massive opportunities for Scotland’s workers and industries.
The new resources comprise:
• A handbook which makes the case for adaptation from a Trade Union (and broader just transition) perspective including examples of how climate impacts are already impacting schools, offices, shops, depots, warehousing, care homes, hospitals, and outdoor workplace settings.
• A workbook which takes users on a step-by-step journey in identifying potential climate change hazards in their workplace and provides information to help union officers and reps in Scotland take action to build resilience and protect workers from the unavoidable impacts of climate change.
• There is also a webinar recording which explores climate risks and building resilience in the workplace for Trade Unions. Watch the recording here.
You can access these resources and find out more about the project on the Adaptation Scotland website
The Adaption Scotland programme is funded by the Scottish Government and delivered by sustainability charity Sniffer