"Over 3,000 people have signed our petition calling on the Government to stop handing out oil and gas permits for onshore drilling in Taranaki" says Urs Signer, member of community group Climate Justice Taranaki.

"The government’s Block Offer 2020 tender for oil and gas exploration permits covers over 20% of the Taranaki region. Today, we have formally lodged our Block Offer bid to end all oil and gas drilling in Taranaki. To consider further fossil fuel drilling in the middle of a climate emergency is completely irresponsible. Despite politicians saying that climate change is a priority, successive governments have failed to create meaningful change. It’s now up to us to rise up together for climate justice."

"We are seeing and feeling the impacts of climate change with our very own eyes: heat waves across several continents in the Northern Hemisphere; sea-surface temperatures that are beyond extreme; floods in numerous countries after severe rain events. Here in Aotearoa, the storms this summer that have brought so much devastation to communities in Tāmaki Makaurau, Te Tai Rāwhiti and Te Matau-a-Māui (Hawke’s Bay) need to be our wake-up call. Despite the scientific community urging us all to take actions, our CO2 and methane emissions keep rising."

"We are calling on the Government to end the block offers on the 1565.5 km² of onshore Taranaki land that would allow oil and gas drilling. Rather than joining the corporate bids to destroy the land, waterways and atmosphere, we are making an alternative bid in defence of our planet. We are together bidding for the future - one without more oil and gas drilling in Taranaki" concludes Signer.

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