The International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) has published our report ‘Climate Justice, Worker Justice’ outlining our demands for investment in sustainable transport, just transition and emissions reductions which we will be taking to governments and employers at COP28 in Dubai.
The report identifies four key items on the COP28 agenda where action is crucial to enable a worker-led just transition that can deliver the goals of the Paris Agreement: the Global Stocktake, the New Collective Quantified Goal, the Loss and Damage Fund, and the Just Transition Work Programme (JTWP).
The shift to sustainable transport is key to curbing climate emissions, and transport workers have a vital part to play in such climate action. At the same time, transport workers are already being impacted by global warming. It is critical that transport worker voices feed into decisions on how the world moves forward.
The shift to sustainable transport requires a new, global system-wide change to support decarbonisation and resilience plans for each transport sector, driven by an active voice for workers in decision-making.
“COP28 must take crucial steps forward on a worker-led just transition,” said Stephen Cotton, ITF General Secretary. “It is a concern that the UAE – which is hosting COP 28 – has no independent trade unions and does not recognise the right to freedom of association and collective bargaining. The UAE must fundamentally recognise the critical role of workers in driving climate action. We need concrete outcomes on just transition in climate finance, and a strong workers’ dimension of the Just Transition Work Programme.”
“At COP28, Emirates airline will be in the full glare of the international climate movement, and ahead of COP28, the ITF is calling on both companies to lead in taking action and establishing just transition committees, with elected workers’ representatives, to ensure that workers are co-creators of climate solutions and that their expertise is integrated into decision-making.”
“There is no climate justice without worker justice.”
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Media contacts: ITF: media@itf.org.uk
Note: The 2023 United Nations Climate Change Conference or Conference of the Parties of the UNFCCC (COP28), will be the 28th United Nations Climate Change conference, held from 30 November until 12 December 2023, at the Expo City, Dubai.
About the ITF: The International Transport Workers’ Federation (ITF) is a democratic, affiliate-led federation recognised as the world’s leading transport authority. We fight passionately to improve working lives; connecting trade unions from 147 countries to secure rights, equality and justice for their members. We are the voice for nearly 20 million working women and men in the transport industry across the world.
