Dear Leeds City Councillors,

Honestly, we are disappointed.

Your recent declaration of a Climate Emergency placed Leeds at the forefront of the drive towards a better and safer future. It seemed to give us proof we were getting somewhere.

Unfortunately, since the declaration there have been great inconsistencies between the ambition you appeared to express in March, and the actions you are now taking in our city.

While far from the only example, the expansion of Leeds Bradford airport and the road network alongside is the largest, most polluting and most dangerous of these.

The Youth Strike Movement wants a future for Leeds, the UK and the world that is safer, healthier and fairer. That is our hope. It is what we strike in our thousands for every month.

Should Leeds City Councillors continue to fail to rise to this ambition, they are effectively sealing the fate of catastrophe for the people they should work to protect.

We demand that our council is as clear in its vision of meeting these goals as this we are, that you reverse inconsistent policies and begin to take the vital, ambitious steps that decades of inaction mean we now require.