EAST Lothian’s beaches and sea breezes welcomed thousands of visitors escaping last week’s heatwave but TV news and social media footage showed fires raging elsewhere in the UK and Europe.

This is not like the long hot summer of 1976; now soaring 40-degree temperatures spark wildfires ripping into urban, developed areas, marking a real-time confrontation with climate emergency realities.

As I’ve said here before, climate change crosses boundaries and we’re all in this together. Local, European and Northern Hemisphere solutions are needed, including urgent international consensus agreeing that billions of profits made by oil and gas companies must be channelled into mitigating the environmental damage done by fossil fuels.

Data from 4 Earth Intelligence reveals that urban developments lacking the trees, parks, gardens and green spaces that regulate temperatures suffer the worst heat-related impacts, with residents on low incomes or unemployed most adversely affected.

For decades, London and the South East have experienced an ‘overheating’ economy, a boom fuelled by building densely populated areas now shown to be increasingly un-liveable as the planet warms. Data maps record adjacent urban areas with vastly different micro-climates, with the least climate-hospitable areas housing those most reliant on public services. Tackling poverty requires tackling climate inequalities, not just in the distant ‘global south’ but in our own communities.

East Lothian Council recognised the climate emergency in August 2019, introducing a Climate Change Strategy in 2020 and a five-year sustainability plan for 2020-2025. I’m supporting climate change measures at Holyrood and links to the Scottish Government’s pioneering legislation on climate change and ‘net zero’ can be found at gov.scot/policies/climate-change

There is no doubt that climate change is here to stay – COP26 now seems a long time ago. We all have our individual part to play literally save our planet – this is an issue I want to be saying more upon in my columns in the next few weeks.