Has politics failed?

A few excerpts from Antonio Guterres, UN Secretary General's speech this week:

"We face a direct existential threat.

"Climate change is moving faster than we are

"If we do not change course by 2020, we risk missing the point where we can avoid runaway climate change, with disastrous consequences for people and all the natural systems that sustain us.

...

"And it is why I am calling on civil society, and young people in particular, to campaign for climate action."

Is the UN Secretary General effectively declaring that politics has failed?

I suspect so.

Just 18 months to prevent catastrophic climate change that will be an existential threat to human existence while Theresa May focuses on a corrupt and illegitimate referendum, Putin focuses on convincing the UK that his assassins were just tourists and Trump, well... This sounds very much like an utter failure of mainstream politics to me.

People need to realise that 18 month figure. Unless we do something radical and very quickly we can kiss goodbye to future generations. It is their existence that is threatened. The hot house Earth report set out why. 60m sea level rises and so on. Indeed, Guterres's speech mirrors some of that report.

Yes I know that scaring people doesn't jolt a change in belief or behaviour but the bus is going off the cliff as the drivers have gone quite mad.