Fifty people turned out in Moruya on Saturday to Ring the Bell for Climate Action during the international climate conference COP28.

Representing 350 Eurobodalla, emergency department nurse Niall O’Donnell said he is very concerned about the health impact of climate emergencies.

“The future is going to be dependent on what local groups like this can do,” O’Donnell said. “All these folks who are working day in and day out to try and make a difference are getting some results.”

O’Donnell praised the Newcastle blockade and the local people who searched for greater gliders and got two logging coupes shut down just north of us. “Locally SHASA have created this heat haven for the community,” he said, pointing to the church’s Red Door Hall.

“You’re here showing up and that makes a big difference as well,” he told the crowd.

St John’s Church rector Reverend Linda Chapman said, “the climate crisis is affecting our emotional and mental health and it’s affecting our physical health.”

Rev Chapman quoted a Lancet study which reported a shocking increase in heat related deaths due to climate change and warned of an increase in life threatening diseases and food insecurity.

Rev Chapman said, “people might feel grief, anger and might even feel despair, but we need hope. Hope is active, it is muscular and it is fostered by communities like this, it is fostered by collective action, by coming together.”

“We ring the bell 28 times to signify our call to action by the Australian government and our hopeful expectation of this climate conference,” Rev Chapman said.

After ringing the St John’s bell, people wrote their asks of the Australian government on a large scroll that will be delivered to our local MP Fiona Phillips.