London: Extinction Rebellion, the UK-based radical climate change protest group that has led a worldwide movement, says it’s temporarily halting the controversial tactics in a bid to win more public support.

Extinction Rebellion Co-founder Clare Farrell said the movement was putting its polarising techniques aside to encourage a broader cross-section of the public to join their major rally in April.

Extinction Rebellion activists are removed by City of London Police after they blocked the road during the Lord Mayor’s Show 2021 in London.Credit:Getty

Farrell denied the change in tactics was recognition that they had turned off the general public who might otherwise share their concerns about the need to limit global warming.

“What it is, is a call to arms for the ordinary citizens who are saying along with the media, ‘I like what they say, it [climate change] is really bad but I don’t like what they do,’” she told The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.

“So what we’re saying to them is this time, show up,” she said.

Extinction Rebellion wants the April march to emulate the 2003 Iraq war protests, when one million people marched across London, joining around 36 million people worldwide who are estimated to have demonstrated against the military invasion that year.

This time the group aims to rally 100,000 people outside Parliament.

Extinction Rebellion began in October 2018 and its first major protest outside British Parliament was addressed by the teenager Greta Thunberg, who catapulted to international attention for her own school strikes over climate change.

The organisation made a name for itself with its radical stunts that included protesters supergluing their hands to key landmarks, including the gates of Downing Street and Buckingham Palace.

Other forms of protest included randomly “swarming” key junctions to block and disrupt traffic, stopping public transport and blockading ports.

The movement has gained endorsements from celebrities Emma Thompson, Benedict Cumberbatch and Stephen Fry but their tactics have also been denounced as dangerous.

One of the biggest names to join Extinction Rebellion’s April protests in London was Emma Thompson, but her appearance was condemned after she flew to the event from the US in a carbon-spewing plane. Credit:AP

The UK government says the disruption they caused costs hundreds of millions of pounds and stop ordinary people from getting to work, accessing medical help and attending important events like funerals.

A YouGov poll of 3296 British adults conducted in September 2021 found that 80 per cent of the public had negative views of the organisation.

Farrell said if the April march “didn’t work” she expected people would revert to the more extreme forms of protests but sounded lukewarm when asked if she personally planned to return to those herself.

Clare Farrell of Extinction Rebellion.Credit:Extinction Rebellion

A Public Order Bill before the House of Commons would make many of Extinction Rebellion’s hallmark protest tactics illegal and punishable with jail terms.

Farrell has been fined around £300 ($532) over her own involvement in protests and is being prosecuted over a demonstration in Canary Wharf. If convicted she faces up to 18 months imprisonment.

Seven women are due to be sentenced later this month and could be jailed, after being convicted of causing criminal damage to the headquarters of Barclays bank in Canary Wharf in 2021.

Farrell conceded that the UK government’s proposed new Public Order Bill was a factor in the change of heart.

“I don’t know that it’s directly in response to that but that is a part of the context that we’re working in now,” she said.

Extinction Rebellion UK sparked an international movement with offshoots springing up in the Solomon Islands, Australia, South Africa, the United States and India.

Asked if she would advise those de-centralised arms of the movement to also call time on their tactics, Farrell said it depended on their country’s circumstances.

“People choose their tactics depending on where they are in the world, it’s entirely case-dependent,” she said.

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