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When my Uncle Teddy, founder of The Ecologist magazine and co-founder of the Green Party, died recently, it caused me to reflect on his life at the centre of the environmental movement.
It's hard to imagine that back when Teddy started out some half a century ago, he had to stand more or less alone, ridiculed for his ideas; today, our Prime Minister calls for worldwide action on climate change. But while in terms of the rhetoric, times have changed dramatically, the truth is that we aren't significantly closer to addressing the global environmental crisis. The gulf between what our leaders want us to believe they are doing and what they are actually doing is staggering.
There has been some progress — for instance, targets to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. But they are set so far into the distance that few of today's politicians will be held responsible when they're missed. What's more, the mechanisms for realising those targets are yet to be identified.
And while the Government is ostensibly focused on emissions reductions, that does little to address the broader environmental problem: we are shifting from an era of abundance towards one of scarcity — a situation caused by a combination of massive population growth, insatiable consumption and an ever-shrinking resource base. Without a major policy shift, we are going to hit a wall. Yet that terrifying truth has almost no bearing on actual policy decisions.
Sooner or later, this is going to have to change. That's why this week's meeting in New York, where nearly 100 heads of government gathered to develop answers to climate change ahead of the UN's climate summit in Copenhagen, was so important.
Unfortunately, nothing very concrete emerged, and the prognosis for Copenhagen is shaky. But there is at least the basis for an agreement. Germany, for instance, has said it would be willing to cut emissions by 30 per cent by 2020 if other EU countries follow suit. President Sarkozy, who earlier announced that he would introduce a new but barely understood “carbon tax”, has called for another interim meeting in November. President Obama made some strong remarks but no commitments at all.
Most importantly, however, China broke new ground by pledging to make substantial emission reductions and to plant 40 million hectares of new forest. And Japan has promised to cut emissions to a level 25 per cent lower than its 1990 levels by 2020.
But there is a bigger political challenge here. Even if governments do reach agreement it will be about targets, and targets are meaningless without clear policies for achieving them. This is where our own government has failed spectacularly. Energy and Climate Change Secretary Ed Miliband has pushed the boat out with his proposals but he is routinely contradicted by his Government's other policies. Trebling airport capacity, new coal-fired power plants and the car scrappage scheme all point us in the wrong direction.
The reason for this reality gap is that ministers believe — wrongly — that meaningful action would present voters with a choice: economy or environment. But it's a false choice: we can safeguard our economy and the environment at the same time. We need to put a realistic cost on pollution and waste, and at the same time attach a value to the sort of things we want to encourage. If our tax system penalised and rewarded in that way, clean companies would have the edge while polluting companies would be left behind. With the right signals, whole sectors would flip: car companies would make cars that cost less to run while manufacturers would make products designed to last.
When we emerge from the recession we can choose something different. Instead of recreating the conditions that delivered the downturn at the same time as trashing our environment, we can build an economy that is cleaner, greener and much less wasteful and where green choices that are currently available only to the committed or wealthy few become mainstream. In doing so, we will open opportunities on a massive scale: jobs will be created and the market, so long an engine of destruction, will be reconciled with the environment.
We don't need to imagine a far-fetched future, or pin our hopes on technologies that don't yet exist. Almost everything we need to do is already being done somewhere. Micro-generation of energy in Germany, combined heat and power plants in Copenhagen, zero-waste policies in Japan and New Zealand, regeneration of fish stocks in parts of Central America, our very own Eurostar: the solutions already exist. If we took the best of today in every sector and made it the norm of tomorrow, we'd be halfway or further to our goal.
Nor do we have to tax people into poverty to do it. For instance, if taxes made the dirtiest cars more expensive to buy then at the same time we'd make the cleanest cars cheaper.
The key is honesty. “Green” cannot be allowed to become an excuse for stealth taxes. And nor should “green taxes” be about punishment. Instead they should represent a switch of emphasis. So if domestic flights are taxed, it should be on the absolute condition that the money is ploughed into improving the alternatives, such as trains. Awareness of these problems has already mushroomed into something close to a consensus.
But so far, at least in the UK, that is as yet generating only gestures from government. America has just elected a President who chose to make the environment a central part of his platform. Some time next year, it is likely that we will have a new Prime Minister: one who puts the environment at the top of his agenda. If that happens, and if in the course of their respective first terms we don't make significant progress, the effect will be demoralising in the extreme.
Thus the responsibility of Obama and David Cameron to deliver will be immense — but they also have a rare opportunity to create a genuinely lasting legacy.
Zac Goldsmith is Conservative parliamentary candidate for Richmond Park and North Kingston. His new book, The Constant Economy: How to Create a Stable Society, is published this month by Atlantic Books.
Reader views (7)
It is these twerps who are forcing us to use the useless fluorescent light bulbs and even more useless windmills, imagining they are 'saving the planet' what are these 'environmental activists' going to say when even their biased computer models (once again proving the 'rubbish in, rubbish out maxim) cannot explain why the climate has cooled! Which it has done anyway over the past decade.
One imagines they are surely working on their spin right now in preparation for that eventuality.
- Ian, Marbella, Spain., 05/10/2009 19:38
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The truth is that Zac Goldsmith, like his father , isn't really interested in taking part in democracy, just to define it. This 'progressive conservatism' that he has allied himself with is really just garbage, a grab for power.
- Andrew Preston, Taunton, Somerset, 01/10/2009 16:27
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And for anyone who is actually interested in the science of global warming, or rather, the lack of it, can I recommend :
http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=7168
Another big part of the foundation of the global warming scam has just been kicked away. I recommend comment #10 as a good introduction for newcomers.
- Freddy, London, 28/09/2009 12:44
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Yet another big tax/big government fraudster riding the global warming bandwagon. I suppose that when you have taxed airlines enough, then the airports won't be full of ordinary people going abroad on holiday, and jet-setting will return to being the preserve of you and your rich friends.
I also suppose that you won't notice the increase in cost of living that your energy taxes are going to impose on everyone. But there are many people - poor and elderly - who are going to be in significant financial trouble because of you and your cohorts.
And all this based on a small amount of scientific fraud and statistical incompetence, and a huge amount of PR budget.
A plague on all your houses.
- Freddy, London, 28/09/2009 10:23
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"So if domestic flights are taxed, it should be on the absolute condition that the money is ploughed into improving the alternatives, such as trains"
What use is that going to serve with the rubbish, privatised system the Tories set up for us? It will just go straight into the pockets of the fat cat operating companies. Joined up thinking? Pah!
- Robert C, London UK, 25/09/2009 16:07
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Glad to see an environmentalist avoiding the dogma that permeates anti-capitalist green debates. Far from being the problem, capitalism and the market is the answer - it just needs enlightened politicians to create the regulatory, incentive and tax environment to unleash the endeavour and creativity that only the free market can provide. It is pretty clear that businesses are ready to make the investments once the technology is proven, and that this will permeate down to consumer level as prices fall. Green taxes, however, are a concern - especially at the consumer level where they'll look like another stealth tax or tax on consumption. Far fairer would be accurate metering of resources so that the big users are no longer subsidised by small users (with regulators ensuring that resources are priced based on usage).
Meanwhile the government should use its clout to encourage private enterprises. The Victorians would have held competitions - a prize for the first generator to use tidal power for 10MW or the first car to drive 100 miles averaging 30mph fuelled by water etc etc. A final concern is the green lobby being able - ironically - to override the conservation lobby. Wind turbines are ugly and it is unsustainable from a quality of life POV to force them on beauty spots. On post-industrial landscapes, however, they look like slender beacons of hope.
- Milton-Not-Keynes, London, 25/09/2009 13:14
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Hope the 'best of today' does not include covering more of the beautiful English countryside with 400 foot wind turbines. The Scots have gone turbine mad and the results are a disaster.
- Tom, Bristol, 25/09/2009 12:26
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