New Adopt a Negotiator: BREAKING: New Zealand opens consultation on post 2020 climate plan

Today, New Zealand’s Government opened consultation on our plan for a low carbon economy after 2020 – our Intended Nationally Determined Contribution. This is the plan we submit to the United Nations before this year’s big Paris conference for how we’re going to cut our emissions after 2020. “To understand what’s important to New Zealanders […]

New Adopt a Negotiator: New Zealand Minister of Conservation: “I refute the facts”

When I was growing up in the 1990s, Maggie Barry was a beloved television presenter. Her gardening expertise was unparalleled. Whether your question was where to plant your hyacinths or how to really bring out the colonial Victorian side of your rose garden in Epsom, Auckland (it’s a bit like England, only more English), Maggie was the […]

New Adopt a Negotiator: Replacing Russel: Who will continue the NZ Greens’ climate leadership?

Since his 2006 election as Green Party of Aotearoa New Zealand co-leader, Russel Norman has steadily built the Party’s calibre on climate issues. Over and over again, he – along with Kennedy Graham, Julie Ann Genter and others – has hounded our Government MPs on their backwards climate policies. A few key moments of his climate […]

New Adopt a Negotiator: Another oil spill in New Zealand waters

A large oil leak in the Tauranga Harbour is believed to have been caused by two very small corrosion holes in a Mobil fuel pipeline. An unknown amount of oil leaked into Tauranga Harbour on Monday from a pipeline, with sludgy, black clumps of oil found as far away as Maungatapu. – NZ Herald We […]

New Adopt a Negotiator: Yeb Saño fasts for the climate – and quits diplomacy to seek climate justice

Eighteen months ago, then Philippines Climate Commissioner Naderev ‘Yeb’ Saño did something extraordinary. When he addressed the opening of the Warsaw climate talks just after Typhoon Haiyan struck his hometown, he spoke truth to power, calling on his fellow climate negotiators to stop the madness of climate disaster – and announcing that he would Fast until […]

New Adopt a Negotiator: Where’s New Zealand’s climate plan? And who’s counting what?

New Zealand should have submitted its plan for shaking itself off its carbon addiction on Tuesday. It didn’t. Instead, our Government started to sell off new oil drilling rights on Monday and tried to cut down environmental reporting standards on Wednesday. 2015 marks the beginning of the end of the age of fossil fuels. Our major trading […]

New Adopt a Negotiator: Bill McKibben fasts for the climate

Today, Bill McKibben of 350.org joins the worldwide Fast for the Climate movement’s365 day rolling climate fast from Lima to Paris. He won’t eat today to stand in solidarity with the victims of climate disaster. Coming in the wake of Super Cyclone Pam tearing at trail of devastation through the Pacific, Bill’s stand is particularly moving for me as […]

New Adopt a Negotiator webinar: Writing about National Climate Commitments

On Monday night, Christian Teriete from TckTckTck, Denise Fontanilla of Jubilee South and I had a chat with Adopt a Negotiator’s Chris Wright about how to communicate the upcoming Intended Nationally Determined Commitments national plans for facing up to climate change from 2020 on. If there’s ever been a time to write about Climate Change, its […]

New Adopt a Negotiator: Why I Fast: New Zealanders and the Philippines’ typhoons

I haven’t eaten today. I am fasting with the global #Fastfortheclimate movement. I’ve written about the Fast here before, and I won’t repeat the story of Yeb Saño launching the Fast during the Warsaw climate talks in the wake of Typhoon Haiyan. That is why I fast: to call for climate justice in solidarity – not […]

Herald interview: Climate change talks: Dead rats and other ‘disturbing metaphors’

Twelve hours before the Lima climate talks ended, John Weekes from the Herald interviewed me about developments. Luckily, I called it right, and the talks ended just as predicted. Talk of swallowing dead rats and “circumcisions turning into amputations” has spiced up the fragile global climate change talks dragging on in Peru. New Zealand lawyer […]

David Tong

Campaigner | Former litigator

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