Steph, North West Champion, Manchester, Oct 2006
Hi, everyone I'm just at the Manchester Environment Education Network and it’s a forum where there’s loads of organisation of teachers and supporting teachers.

So we can find something out by looking around, it’s a bit empty because everyone has gone out to the workshops, I’ll be doing my own workshop later. I’m giving out the climate change the film to people, now I'm looking forward to my workshop speaking to some teachers and getting them to spread the message to help this generation about the climate change.

As you can see we’re having a meeting with sir David King and we put our questions to him concerning climate change, and one of the questions raised was 'are schools doing enough to communicate to children the issues and the urgencies of the challenge?'

Glaciers significantly affected by climate change which are illustrated in this picture… recession happen during out lifetime and the champions are holding their birthdates to represent the amount of glacier that has receded.

This red dot represents Andermatt not just the place, but also as the people who are affected by climate change now. It also has affected their lifestyle, their walking lifestyles, their skiing lifestyles as well as tourism and the economy. 

I got some feedback from people making sure children are interested in climate change. And that they do it in an interactive and fun way. Am looking forward to going back to my college and do the same.

Jordan, South East Champion, Hove, Oct 2006
Hi, this is Jordan Stephens, South East climate change champion. I’ve just been speaking at the One Planet Living Day 14 October. And I’ve just done a little presentation in front of these people in Rally Hall and it was really good fun. Slight problem with the technical side but got through it quite well… fun day… fun presentation, about to go and watch the Al Gore film, it should be good, haven’t seen that yet. So am looking forward to it. Am here with Alex and Tony. It’s cool.

We’ve got our very own Jordan Stephens.

To get people involved we need to make climate change a local and important issue. Importantly we all need to make the message positive and show that we can collectively put brakes on climate change.

For example, footballers who buys 4x4 and Hummers would be better of buying houseboats, they might need them. 

In Switzerland and around the world glaciers by in large are retreating at faster and faster rates. We travelled to Switzerland by…now I wonder how many of you here thought we travelled by plane, well actually, we travelled by train.

Put your hands up if you ever bought an energy saving light bulb? OK... we’ll skip to the next bit then.

Sofia, West Midland Champion and Sarah, East of England Champion, London, Nov 2006
Good evening everyone my name is Sofia, and I m the climate change champion for West Midlands. The climate change issue is evolving and there’s a growing need for us all, like the government, individuals like you and I and businesses to appreciate carbon as a central theme.

If we all had a better understanding about the amount of carbon emissions we each produce then it would be easier to do something about it.

Good evening everyone. In July this year, the Champions travelled to Switzerland to learn more about the affects of climate change.

Whilst Switzerland will suffer, the impact of climate change on the poorer parts of the world would be on a different scale.

We know this climate change problem is big. But what can we do? Working together, we need to help people understand climate change and what they should do to help tackle it.

We need to challenge others to get involved and we need to learn about our own energy use. And think about the carbon created from that, and it is really important to remember no matter how small, every effort to reduce the amount of carbon, helps. 

It gives me great pleasure to introduce to you the Secretary of State for Environment,  David Miliband.

This is not just about my son and his generation and future generations actually, it’s about what we do now. So when Sarah said that this generation, it is not just for the teenage generation but also for those of us at the moment”. These young people show that you can combine an idealism with a real sense of rigour. I would say well done on that. Well done on what you are doing. The trip to Switzerland it was important that you didn’t fly. It may seem like it’s sort of a small thing actually it’s quite important.
 
David, North East Champion and Zoheb, Yorkshire and Humber Champion, Sheffield, Nov 2006.
I’ve just done my presentation today; it went really great and just helping the attendees, am just getting a vision on climate change in the future. So it went really great.

David entered a newspaper article for the climate change competition and he says he wants to keep his message about climate change, simple and easy to understand. He feels that we need to get across that it’s cool to be eco friendly.
 
There are opportunities all around us, there are energy efficient light bulbs, there are several of my friends who walk to school instead of going by car and I think there are more people who should walk to work.  There are other ways for example instead of driving to work you can car share.

Now, from memory, Zoheb was putting tough questions to the Environment Secretary David Miliband. And it was only the Secretary’s fourth day in office. 

Good morning everyone, my name is Zoheb Khalil, and I’m the champion for the Yorkshire and Humber region. In this photo I was standing on the glacier when I was born many many years ago. I became the champion because I wanted my voice to be heard.

That is the message I want to deliver to all of you here today, stand up and be counted.

And I know that you know that you should have left your car at home today. If you don’t do these things then us champions  might have to pay you a visit, now that may not sound that bad, but if you’ve got a teenage son or daughters…. just imagine nine of us at your place.