The Frank Skinner Show - Frank Skinner in conversation with Al Gore

Episode Date: August 15, 2017

Hear the interview about climate change and Al Gore's new movie.

Frank Skinner in conversation with Al Gore on Absolute Radio. This is Frank Skinner on Absolute Radio. The next hour is going to be a little bit different from what you might expect. From my perspective, it's not Saturday morning, and from the station's perspective, there will be no Nickelback. But it's all for a very good reason. I'm going to be talking to a man who has had a massive impact on global attitudes to climate change.

The film An Inconvenient Truth is a double Oscar winner and since its release in 2006, it's been included on school curricula around the world. 11 years on, he's back with an inconvenient sequel, Truth to Power. My guest today is Al Gore. Well, thank you. Thank you for having me. Mr. Gore, what a pleasure. Now, is Mr. Gore okay as an address? Of course it is. Al is okay as well. Al as well. Well, it's so rare I get to call anyone I'm interviewing Mr. I might stick with that. But thank you.

Your adequacy also works. I just noticed that in your new film that the mayor of Georgetown, Texas, calls you Mr. Vice President. And I thought, oh, God, do you keep that title forever? Well, the U.S. is a little unusual in that respect. And some people do that. But you certainly need not. Okay. Well, anyway, as I say, it's great to have you on.

And I have much to ask. Can I tell you, first of all, something that happened to me? I went to a screening of your new movie, and we were given free tea on the way in, including a plastic spoon. And I said to the guy, what do I do with this spoon? And he said, just put it in the bin. And I said, this is an Al Gore event.

I can't do that. And I i honestly i licked it clean i took it home and it is in my cutlery good for you that is down to you would you think it's fair to say that that the first movie an inconvenient truth do you think it changed the world is that an overstatement or is that a fair thing to say? Well, not for me to say, but many others have made generous assessments of the impact that movie had. I run into people all over the world who say very generous things about the impact it had on their lives and the number of people who changed the course of their lives, started new businesses, went into government service, started NGOs. So it makes me happy when I hear stories like that. Yeah. Do you feel slightly disappointed that you needed a sequel 10 years later. Does that suggest that the progress hasn't been quite what you hoped it would be?

Well, the title, An Inconvenient Sequel, Truth to Power, captures that a bit, I suppose. We've actually made quite a bit of progress globally. The problem is worse. made quite a bit of progress globally. The problem is worse. The climate-related extreme weather events are more numerous and more destructive, and that's not progress. But we have seen the organization of a global response. We've seen some very dramatic developments in the technology area with solar electricity, wind electricity, electric cars, batteries, a whole range of other technologies that help us reduce emissions become imminently affordable now. And that is progress. And, of course, we've seen the Paris Agreement a year and a half ago, which was an historic breakthrough in spite of Donald Trump's opposition to it.

The U.S. is going to meet our commitments without Donald Trump's leadership. Yeah, he becomes a sort of Darth Vader figure in the movie when the final caption says President Trump announced that the U.S. would be withdrawing from the Paris Agreement. The next to final caption. After that are some more that show how the American people are leading without him. And actually, the day he made that speech, June 1st, I was very concerned that other countries might use it as an excuse to withdraw themselves. But I was very happy one day later when the entire world redoubled its commitment to the Paris Agreement. And in the United States, our largest state governments and hundreds of cities and lots of business leaders all stood up to say, we'll fill the gap,

we're going to stay in, and we're going to meet the US commitments without Donald Trump. It's really, I find that amazing, because I always think that if America aren't involved, I saw an interview with Vladimir Putin recently, and he was talking about NATO. And he said, well, look, if America withdrew from NATO, that would be the end of it. And I kind of think that's true of more or less every international agreement. So I'm surprised you're putting such a brave face on Trump's statement. It seemed to me like it would be a major blow. Yeah, I feared it would be. It turns out not to have been. And I think one reason for that is something we all learned in school. It's the law of physics that says for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. And decision on the Paris Agreement has been quite extraordinary. It has led to the biggest upsurge in grassroots activism that I've ever seen, at least since the anti-Vietnam War days.

So he could be great news for the climate change movement. I wouldn't go that far because we... Well, as a polarizing effect. Well, yes. When you you think do i want to be in the same camp as this guy yeah then it might it might fire people i i i think there i think it is having that effect now i think we could make even more progress even faster if he was on side and if he brought his core supporters with him, but he is opposed. And so we have to work around him. And the good news is that a lot of people are quite put off by what he's been doing and saying, and they're organizing on their own. I've seen this before, by the way. I know we're a little bit off topic, but years ago when Ronald Reagan was a candidate

for president in 1980, he started talking about the evil empire and he wanted to restart the nuclear arms race. And in short order, people were so worried by all that that the nuclear freeze movement emerged. And a huge grassroots movement ultimately led to a successful arms control agreement. And Reagan himself eventually changed on that. And so I do think that the way he's been behaving has inspired a lot of activism that might not have bubbled up in the same way without him. I mean, to be fair to President Trump, which isn't, I don't often start sentences like that. But he, he made it pretty clear before he was voted in that that was his view on climate

change. And so he's not the bad guy in this. I guess the people who voted for him knowing that are the bad guys. I mean, the fact that he was then voted in on that ticket, does that mean, does that make you feel like you've failed as far as the American public is concerned? Well, first of all, I think that the majority of his voters were not supporting him on that issue. And the polling shows that two thirdsthirds of the American people disagree with him. A majority of Republican voters disagree with him. A plurality of the people who voted for him in the Republican primaries disagree with him on this issue. So I think there was a generalized anger at the way things are going. I think you saw the same thing with the Brexit leave campaign

here. And we've seen similar manifestations in other countries. Middle income wages have stagnated for decades. And the causes are complicated, but the anger is palpable and real. And so when a demagogue comes along and focuses that anger on, you know, make America great again, his slogan and all that surrounds that, I think that people wanted to kind of turn the table over, so to speak, and say, all right, we've had it. We'll even vote for this guy if that's what it takes to send a message. Yeah, I mean, everyone you vote for, they don't tick every box. But I would have thought the fact that he might be party to destroying the planet is quite a big thing to

forgive him when you're making your choices. I agree. I would say, and I think this is said about Brexit as well, I come from a working class background. And I think there is a general sense of a lot of sort of straight talking, perfectly bright, intelligent, working class, salt of the earth people thinking we're fed up of pinko liberals telling us how to think. And that's what this... Isn't it a problem for the climate change movement that it is kind of certainly i think in this country i kind of associate it with the middle classes to some extent with people who have maybe went to university not with to use hillary clinton's not with the basket of deplorables i mean there seems to be i have a foot in both camps so i have sympathies with people who think, oh, I don't know, is this just people telling us how to think again? of income with such a large percentage of the new income going to the very top of the income ladder.

That really makes people mad, understandably so. And for all of the people who said globalization is going to help everybody and all these trade deals are going to help everybody and people who feel left behind, I think had an impulse to say well the experts aren't that hot uh so maybe they're wrong on this too yeah i just don't know how saving the planet became a middle class thing rather than a working class thing we're all in the same yeah horrible scary boat at the moment aren't we well, the large carbon polluters have spent a lot of money trying to focus the general anger against the climate advocates. And in this, they have, at least in my country, they've used the playbook written by the tobacco companies years ago, who pushed back against the medical consensus on smoking and lung cancer by spending a lot of

money. They hired actors and dressed them up as doctors and put them on camera to falsely reassure people that there were no problems at all. And the carbon polluters have actually taken that same blueprint, hired some of the same PR professionals, and have spent over a billion dollars intentionally creating confusion and false doubts and driving a partisan wedge into the discussion of climate and making it almost a tribal badging exercise. If you're not skeptical of what the scientists say then maybe you're with the other side yeah it's almost like um flower power and peace and love movement of the 60s it's seen as this whimsical impractical thing that people believe in which us real people we Real people, we know, we love coal and oil and all that stuff.

And yet, two-thirds do support action and understand it. And globally, it is one of the two top concerns. The U.S. is a bit different. The U.K. may be slightly different. But globally, climate and terrorism are the two biggest concerns. I just came from Germany, where it is the number one concern, outranking terrorism, even though they've had these terrorist attacks. And I think that one of the reasons why it is an issue recognized by people in every income group now has to do with Mother Nature. These climate-related extremes are so common now. Every night on the TV news is like a nature hike through the Book of Revelation. Whether the newscaster connects the dots or not, people are connecting them.

Just yesterday here in the UK, there was one of these rain bombs that had a month's worth of rain in one day. In my country this week and last week, both New Orleans and Miami were flooded out and partially paralyzed by one of these rain bombs. Seven inches of rain in two hours. Can I tell you that heavy rain is not a new phenomenon in this country? No, but it actually is much heavier now than it has been. A year ago, December, the all-time

historic rainfall occurred here in the UK, if you recall. This is Absolute Radio and there's more from Al Gore next. Frank Skinner in conversation with Al Gore on Absolute Radio.

There was part of me when I went to see the new movie that I thought maybe the problem has been solved and the governments have got together and said, well, it should be Al Gore that announces it. And so you were going to come on and say, you know what? It's okay

guys. I thought, I was looking forward to that. In fact, you see and so you were going to come on and say you know what it's okay guys i thought i was looking forward to that in fact it was more i felt like i was one of those roman slave galleys and in you were coming up with the whip hitting us across the back reminding us we've got to keep rowing i missed that part of the movie but that's the message isn't it that we've we haven't really dented it yet. Well, no, the problem's been getting worse. We're putting today another 110 million tons of this global warming pollution into the skies. Can I ask you about that, Mr. Gore? Because it seems as I've grown up, people in hybrid cars, wind farms and all that,

I've watched it happen and blossom and grow. I need you to tell me that we can see some evidence that it's making a difference. You seem to suggest that it isn't working all that well. No, no, no, it is working. We're gaining on the problem. Global emissions of this global warming pollution have actually stabilized in the last three years for the first time. And they've been going down in Europe and North America, and they're going down in China, too, for three years in a row. Some of the fast-growing

developing countries are still increasing their emissions. And yet still, globally, we have stabilized. That's not good enough because we need to start bringing it down. But the good news is that electricity from solar photovoltaic panels is now getting so cheap in many areas of the world. Three contracts were signed just within the last couple of months where unsubsidized electricity from solar is being contracted at less than half the cost of electricity from burning coal. the global investments in new electricity generation have been way more in renewables than in fossil fuels. So in the US last year, 75% of all the new electricity generation came from solar and wind, virtually none from coal. So there is some good news, but we shouldn't shout it too loud in case people stop trying.

So there is some good news, but we shouldn't shout it too loud in case people stop trying. That's essentially correct. We're making progress. We're not yet making progress fast enough. But a famous economist once said, Rudy Dornbusch, he said, things take longer to happen than you think they will. And then they happen much faster than you thought they could. And that's what characterizes solar and wind and now electric cars uh and and batteries and hundreds of new efficiency technologies that don't get the news media attention but they're extremely important

the film starts very bravely i thought with a series of disparate voices all criticizing you quite heavily. I don't know if that was a good tactic or not. Because I thought, you know, I had no doubts about Al Gore until I watched this film. Seems everyone hates him back home in America. Yeah, well, it's a good thing that I didn't have control over the editing of the film because not only because of that reason, but because in my mind, I'm much younger and thinner with darker hair. And a lot of those scenes would never have made it into the movie.

Well, you are. I suppose it's sad in a way that there's lots of footage of you much younger basically saying the same things. And I thought, oh, God god this is such a long long ascent for al gore to keep climbing this mountain i've been at it for 40 years but i've learned a lot on the way and one thing that's different now is that the hope is much more tangible and real. You remember the scene describing what the nation of Chile is doing with solar energy. It's absolutely stunning.

And the scene in Georgetown, Texas, where a conservative Republican Trump-supporting mayor of the most conservative Republican city in Texas, as they describe themselves in the heart of oil country. He's an accountant. So he did the arithmetic and he decided to convert his entire city to 100% renewable electricity. And now their bills have come down considerably. The air is cleaner and it's kind of a side benefit that they're helping to save the future of humanity. That seems to be the way forward. If you can get people thinking, I'll save money if I do this. I think trusting that the great moral crusade across the board is quite bold. Yeah, we do need both because the way the public thinks has a profound effect on government policy. The way the public thinks has a profound effect on government policy.

And governments around the world are now still subsidizing dirty fossil fuels at a rate 40 times more than the meager subsidies for renewable energy. Is it basically about money? When I think of it as you and a lot of people in shoes that might have been made from cabbage leaves sitting around talking, and then on the other side, a lot of rich men, I'm thinking that they're men, who run oil and gas and coal, thinking, no, these guys, we're going to lose a lot of money if these guys get the message through. Is that basically it? Yeah, it's a big part of it, for sure. Absolutely. Because those men, I always think are men who generally win. They are winners. They are powerful, bullying individuals who get their own way. Often, but when there are enough people at the grassroots who are sufficiently passionate and concerned, then democracy can win out. And this climate movement is similar in many ways to movements in the past to, for example, give women the right to vote. There were wealthy men, powerful then, who hated that idea. But over time, it became seen as a simple choice between what's right and what's wrong.

Same with the civil rights movement. When I was growing up in the South, in the United States, when the civil rights movement was gaining momentum believe me the resistance to that movement among white southerners was that was even stronger than the resistance i think it still exists doesn't it that resistance and we still have to make progress but we have made a lot of progress uh and the same is true more recently with gay rights uh and more recently with gay rights. And my generation and even yours might have had many resisting it, but young people said, what is the big deal here? And in my country, if somebody had told me even five years ago that in the year 2017, gay marriage would be legal in all 50 states and two-thirds of the American people would accept, honor, and celebrate it, I would have said, well, I sure hope so, but I think you're being completely unrealistic. But it happened.

The late Nelson Mandela said during the struggle against apartheid once, he said, it's always impossible until it's done. And I think the climate movement is approaching that kind of political tipping point. Yeah, you know, like I say, I'm more worried that it seems to be winning, but I'm not seeing the effects of it as quickly as I hope we might. Now, at the beginning of the film, you're compared to the Nazi minister of propaganda. Goebbels. Yeah. I try not to name check him, if I can avoid it. The naysayers, the anti-Al Gore people, what is their general line of attack?

What do they think your motivation is, if it's not purely to save the planet? Well, there's a time-honored tradition on the part of people who hate a particular message to attack the messenger. So, I suppose it should be considered an honour to be attacked by such people. It doesn't always feel that way. But what do they think you're up to? Do they think, I mean, can I ask you, do you have a tremendous renewable energy company that's going to make billions if this thing kicks off? I have invested where I've put my money where my mouth is at times and have invested in some companies that I hope will succeed. But I've been doing this for 40 years and the other is of relatively recent

vintage. And everything I make, I put into the, from that, I put into the Climate Reality Project, which finances these trainings. And by the way, 100% of the profits from the movie go to training new activists around the world as well. So I don't understand. What is the source of their attack? What do they think you're doing that's bad other than spoiling their potential earning? Well, you'd have to ask them, but I think that what they hate is the message itself and they think it's easier to attack anyone who delivers it.

And by the way, I'm in good company. When Pope Francis came out with his historic encyclical on the global environment, conservatives in the church started attacking the pope in bitter terms. bitter terms and anyone who sticks his head up above the the uh the the drenches on this issue draws attacks yeah well the pope had a he had a nice phrase he talked about intergenerational solidarity yeah in that you actually really care about the generations to come as much as you do that your own children might be sitting at the fireside with you. Yeah. Which is a difficult thing to do.

But it seems to me that if that could happen, then you've kind of won. Yeah. Yeah. And human nature being what it is, it is indeed sometimes difficult to make an appeal based on our duty to future generations but but some people do respond to it as as we all should but the reason why these extraordinary climate related extreme events now are having such an impact is because it's affecting us now in this generation well i've got to be i have a confession to make i have i haven't been great on the recycling and all that thing

because the film starts with images of ice melting. That to me, it seems a long way away, Mr. Goy. It doesn't affect, you know, I've always associated ice melting with a positive renewal of life and the summer is coming and all that. Getting worried about, you know, I'm still pretty resentful about what happened to the Titanic. But it's hard for me. I don't think until I became a father,

which I did quite late in life. I now have a five-year-old. And when I take him to school in the morning and I can taste the dirt in the air, it's only since then that I think of his little lungs getting poisoned. And you need, I think it's all about, it's down to you, if you like, and your people to find those things. Those things that really hit you in the stomach and think, actually, I'm not going to let this happen. Yeah, yeah. A couple of points.

Number one, if you lived in a city like Miami, Florida, you would feel differently about the melting ice melting much faster. I saw fish from the ocean swimming in the streets of Miami on a sunny day just because it was high tide. And there are many coastal cities and coastal regions that are faced with imminent catastrophe. And some of these low-lying island nations in places like Bangladesh. I mean, India has just finished the biggest steel fence in the world on its border with Bangladesh because there are all these millions of climate refugees going north. But secondly, where your child is concerned, something very similar to what you felt when you tasted dirty air and were holding your child's hand, something very similar to that has happened in China and India. In China, in northern China,

life expectancy has gone down five and a half years just because of the air pollution from burning coal. And it became a political issue, not least among parents of young children who said this is unacceptable. Now, the pollution that causes that dirty air is different from the global warming pollution, but it comes from the same practice of burning coal and other dirty fossil fuels. And so the revolutionary changes now being made by China and India have been driven in part by new members of the middle class in those countries who have some additional awareness and political power saying to the governments, this is unacceptable.

We demand change. And it's contributing to a lot of change. This is Absolute Radio, and there's more from Al Gore next. Frank Skinner in conversation with Al Gore on Absol on absolute radio i know this is something you're asked a lot but i don't know if all our listeners will be aware of the fact that you've really really nearly became president in 2000 are you got about as close as you can get you you hit the woodwork except for one one vote on the Supreme Court, one justice. Now, might we look back when we're living in some terrible dystopian world

where most people have been destroyed, might we look back and think, you know what? If Al Gore had won in 2000, terrorism might not have increased at the level it did because probably the Iraq war wouldn't have happened. And also, the global issue would have been put right there. And with all due respect to you, and I think I've heard you say this, you're an influential man, but the President of the United States

is probably the most influential man or woman on the planet. Do you think we'll look back and think it was Florida's fault? They destroyed the world. They didn't vote for Al Gore. If we ever, God forbid, end up living in that dystopian world, I think that those kinds of thoughts will be pretty far down on the list. And as for the underlying question, I don't know how to run the experiment. Maybe when they finish that time machine, we'll be able to go back and undo that. Is there any way that your entire momentum now,

the whole climate change thing that you've been at the head of, is it a sort of having not won the presidency? Is it a sort of mission replacement therapy? Did you need a purpose and it was taken away from you and you needed another one it's not all about me no but but but i will answer your question um in a slightly different way uh when that supreme court decision came down and i checked the Constitution and realized that there's no intermediate step between a final Supreme Court decision and violent revolution and decided to

support the rule of law. Sorry, just for the benefit of our listeners, can I just very briefly, it was a very, very tight vote indeed between you and George Bush. There were several recounts. And in the end, the Supreme Court basically said, this is it. No, they stopped the counting. They stopped the counting. They stopped the first count of the votes. Yeah. Many, many of them. And I bitterly disagreed with that decision. But I supported the rule of law, which in this country and in mine is the bedrock of self-government. And, you know, Winston Churchill famously said of the Americans, they generally do the right thing after first exhausting every available alternative. And that's essentially what I did.

And back to your question a few moments ago, I really had no idea what I was going to do. And I see it as an enormous privilege and indeed a source of joy to have been able to find work that feels like it justifies every bit of energy I can pour into it. You know, if you have work you really love and it feels like you're doing some good and making the world a better place, that's a blessing. And it has been for me.

I work as a stand-up comedian. One thing I thought when I watched the first film was this guy's used up all his material here in a film. You know, there was some good lines and stuff, and now you've done it all again. When you didn't win the presidency, you basically did what a lot of comics do when the TV show gets pulled.

You went on the road. Yeah, yeah. And you really went on the road. And the fact that you made a world-changing film about a science slideshow is quite an achievement. Are you still doing that show now? Still gigging? Yeah, and it only took me 11 years to find new material. Yeah, obviously things aren't as bad as you really need them to be. I have about 40,000 slides at this point.

Wow. I'll show them to you later. No, I'm actually, I just remembered a couple of hundred that are tailored to whatever country I'm in and whatever the particular concerns of the audience might be. Every single day, I have a large staff in Nashville that helps me scour the Internet every day for the new scientific studies, the new extreme events, the new developments in beneficial technologies. And it's actually an exciting narrative.

It's an exciting time of history. We are going to win this. I am very legitimately am very hopeful. But back to a point you made earlier, hopeful but we're not yet winning it fast enough i think we will for sure but we still have to get there there's a bit in the movie and i don't want to do spoilers on this but there's a bit where um i got really quite emotional and that is you're in Paris and the terrorist attacks happen. Normally, I mean, when I heard about that on the news that night, I was tearful, but I couldn't help thinking in the context of the movie. And of course, there's no way I'm trying to play down what happened in Paris. It was a night of horror and tragedy.

But terrorism, we all have a very real fear of it. We can see it. Yeah. The truth is the global warming will probably end up killing a lot more people than terrorists ever will. Already does. Yeah. So how can you get across that same

impact it's almost like and i hate to say this but one way of changing people's minds about anything is a high profile human tragedy we don't need that to eat it to get people to really care about this topic. Yeah, you're putting your finger on something that's really important. One of the reasons it's been hard to mobilize public opinion so far, we're getting there, but one of the reasons it's been hard is that we're not used to thinking in global terms. And if something happens on the other side of the world, it's harder to feel the intimate personal connection to it. And if it plays out over a longer period of time,

the same disconnect can take place. But now that people are feeling it in so many places around the world, in real time, they are connecting the dots. But you're quite right that that's been one of the challenges. But you know, a big public opinion survey of the entire world just came out last week showing that this is now, along with terrorism, last week, showing that this is now, along with terrorism, one of the two top concerns in countries around the world. Different in my country, it's farther down the list, the carbon polluters have been more active there. Different here in the United Kingdom. I just was in Germany two days ago. They've had a number of terrorist attacks, as you know.

Climate is the number one public concern in Germany on the minds of people right now. And I think that enough people have made these connections that they realize this really has to be dealt with. One thing in Europe, you know, the refugees from the Middle East and North Africa have been coming for a number of reasons. But one of them is the climate-related drought in Syria from 2006 to 2010, the worst in recorded history. It killed 80% of the livestock in Syria, destroyed 60% of their farms, all this well before the Syrian civil war broke out, drove a million and a half climate refugees into their cities where they collided with other refugees there from the Iraq war. And when WikiLeaks released all those documents, some of them had the conversations of the government ministers in Syria where they were

saying, this is going to cause a social explosion. We can't deal with this. And although there were other causes of the civil war in Syria, this was one of the main ones. And all these refugees that have been coming across the Mediterranean, one of the causes is the climate-related drought. And there are now some areas in the Middle East and North Africa that are in danger of becoming literally unlivable. Some cities have had a heat index that feels like temperature as high as 74 degrees, 165 Fahrenheit. People can't live in those conditions at all. And so they pick up stakes and move. But this is how to sell the climate change movement to the Brexit voter.

Say it's going to bring in a lot of migrants. One of the biggest advertisements for Brexit was a huge billboard. I know you saw it with an endless line of refugees at the border of the Eastern, of the European Union. And they were refugees that looked like they were coming from the Middle East and North Africa. Have you spoken to President Trump, man to man on this topic? I have. Is there any common ground at all? You know, a couple years before he started running for president, he signed a full-page newspaper ad in the New York Times demanding that Barack Obama do more to solve the climate crisis. So he's been in different places on the issue.

I went to see him after the election, talked with him, and the conversations continued after he went into the White House. And I have protected the privacy of those conversations because I think any president's entitled to that. Until now. Well, I'm not going to violate that now either. But I will simply tell you that I really, I had reason to believe that he would stay in the Paris Agreement. That was my purpose to convince him to. And I thought he would come to his senses, but I was wrong. He didn't.

You see, what worried me about the movie is we see you at Paris trying to broker this agreement. It's 195 countries. Yes, yes. So, really, it's a pretty important thing, it's fair to say. And India are not the bad guys because they argue quite well. It's alright for the Americans. They've had 150

years of fossil fuel to celebrate, to live off. And now they want us to start getting wind farms. It's a pretty powerful argument. It's easy to understand their point of view, for sure. But you just about win them over. Yeah, well, they have been won over in important respects. They have now closed lots of coal burning plants. By the way, they just announced two months ago that in only 13 years, 100% of the new cars and trucks in India will have to be electric vehicles.

That's amazing. That's 10 years before the United Kingdom has pledged to do the same, or France. And now they are building solar farms like they're going out of style. It's quite dramatic, the change. But you kind of pay them to sign the agreement in the movie that you get them a really good deal on a tax thing is that right which you sort of the they they wanted two things one was access to credit to borrow money and by the way when interest rates are nearly zero in the rich countries they have to pay 13 to switch to clean energy. That's ridiculous. So the World Bank came through with a loan after the Paris Agreement. And then they have always wanted access to advanced technology in the West. And, you know, some

companies are now willing to share their technology because they want to create a better world. But that's what worries me most about President Trump, I think, because I think someone that powerful shaking the house of cards at Paris because there were a few tentative commitments that more people like India could lose faith. It's that thing about keeping everyone standing together. Right, right.

I'd like to end on a positive note. I went to see the film with a friend of mine, Charlotte, who hadn't seen the first film, didn't know that much about you. And she said to me after, the way I feel having seen this film, I don't want this feeling to fade. I want to hold on to this. That's great.

How can people do that? I resolved to get a hybrid car or a green car maybe six months ago. I still haven't bought that car. How can you give people that kick up the backside that's going to get us over the hill on this yeah well first of all learn about it i hope others go and see the movie um and then it's not it it's not unimportant to win the conversations on climate because social revolutions are won in conversations, first of all. Then use your vote, and as a citizen, tell the candidates and the office holders

who now represent you that this is important to you. And when you make your choices in stores, in the marketplace, let them know you want more climate-friendly alternatives like the hybrid car or electric car that you're talking about. I just got an electric car myself. I had a hybrid. I got an electric car that you're talking. I just got an electric car myself. I had a hybrid. I got an electric car. They're wonderful. And the new models are becoming eminently affordable. The performance is great. LED light bulbs, the insulating windows, there are lots of choices

that can save you money and reduce your own impact. But it also sends a signal to business and industry that that that they need to do more but i'll say this um as important it is as it is to change things like the light bulbs it's much more important to change the laws because we've got a lot of good people living in bad systems and the system needs to change. We need to get off dirty coal and fossil fuels. We need to stop this wasteful consumption and demand products that are made in ways that don't add to the burden to the environment. Well, I grew up watching sci-fifi movies and there have been many threats to the earth from alien forces and you see the people of earth it's the one moment they become people

of earth rather than their individual nations and they get shoulder to shoulder and they beat this threat yeah like an independence day yeah exactly, so hopefully you're going to be the Bruce Willis in this. You're going to get that vest on. The time has come to beat this enemy. Well, I'm inspired by all the millions of activists around the world at the grassroots. They're the real heroes of this movement. Well, thank you so much for talking to me. I'm going to get that car.

I'm going to get rid of that diesel and get that car. You have inspired me. Tell Charlotte, thanks. I will. She was genuinely moved, so well done, you. Thank you, sir. An Inconvenient Sequel is out in cinemas on Friday, the 18th of August. If you missed any of tonight's programme,

you can listen to the full interview on the Frank Skinner show podcast channel or in the absolute radio mobile app frank skinner in conversation with al gore on absolute radio