It was the percentage that struck me. Twenty-eight people, who had been arrested by Sussex Police but were later found to have committed no crime, applied for their DNA to be expunged from the police database. Only one request was granted, a rate of 3.6% that put Sussex Police bottom of a national league table of police forces.
So I wrote to the chief constable, asking for an explanation. I made it clear I wasn’t seeking to undermine the great job the police do, but that there were civil liberties at stake and I found the statistic alarming.
That led to me having a meeting with two of the force’s most senior community police officers (I won’t give their names given how close we are to a general election), which just happened to take place the same day the government published its proposed revised guidance on holding DNA samples.
A bit of history here. The government currently allows the police to take DNA samples from anyone they arrest or caution, and to keep those samples ad infinitum. The ad infinitum part has been ruled inadmissible by the European Court for Human Rights, which said – rightly in my view – that the DNA of innocent people could not be kept indefinitely.
So the government now has to propose revised rules, and it’s done so. It wants to keep innocent people’s DNA for six years. To me that’s excessive, and it was described by the Lib Dems’ Home Affairs spokesperson in the Lords, Sally Hamwee, as ‘excessive and potentially illegal’. Another legal challenge could well be in the offing.
In the meantime, what is a poor police force to do? Sussex Police have taken the view that, until the guidance is revised and such guidance is accepted, it will continue to hold DNA samples unless it’s absolutely clear that a person was arrested with no connection to the crime under investigation or any other crime.
This explains the 3.6% – and here’s the rub.
If we want the police to do a job, we need to give them all reasonable means to do it. That includes DNA, and also fingerprinting which seems less emotive but in most respects has the same status as DNA. If you have a case where, say, police are called to a domestic disturbance, there’s a suggestion of violence so they arrest a suspect but no charges are pressed, it’s probably right for that person’s DNA to stay on the record books for a reasonable period of time.
But what happens when you get a case like the Crowborough businessman Sal Miah, who was arrested and later given a caution after attempting to protect his restaurant from youths who tried to break in? The police later apologised and a senior officer said the caution has been revoked and the DNA and fingerprints are being destroyed. But because Mr Miah was cautioned, it isn’t a simple case of destroying the DNA, and until the full process has run its course, his details remain on a database along with convicted criminals.
That’s the bit that doesn’t feel right, but I don’t think we should turn our fire on the police but on the government. They need to give us a workable Crime and Security Bill that allows police to keep the DNA of reasonable suspects for a reasonable time, so the police can do their job and civil liberties can be ensured.
I trust the police. They’re professional, motivated by a desire to solve crime, and while there are occasional cases of police malpractice, they’re the exception, not the rule (they’re newsworthy because they’re so rare). And the vast majority of police officers respect the need for civil liberties to be protected – that’s why sensible government guidelines are a potential win/win in this highly emotive issue.
Thursday, 1 April 2010
Saturday, 20 March 2010
THE SCANDAL IS THAT WE’VE NEVER HAD A GOVERNMENT ELECTED BY A MAJORITY OF THOSE WHO VOTED!
I was in Brussels last weekend, celebrating the 20th birthday of an environmental organisation I helped to set up in 1990. Chatting with the various people from a couple of dozen different countries, one thing became very clear – almost all of them come from countries where more than one party is currently in government.
Contrast that with the situation in this country where some sections of society are getting hysterical about the prospect that we could on 7 May have a hung Parliament. What is normal in most other countries appears to be a recipe for national disaster here.
So what’s the difference?
The difference is that we’re not used to different parties cooperating in government. This is not strange, when you think we haven’t had a formal coalition since 1945, or a peacetime coalition since the late 1930s. We had some cooperation between Labour and the Liberals in 1977-78, a short-lived arrangement that served the country well, even if it was disastrous for Liberal fortunes at the polls.
But it’s strange in another way. We have never had a government elected by a majority of those who voted! Maragaret Thatcher’s thumping majority of 144 seats in 1983 was achieved with 44% of the votes. Labour got in in 1997 with a 179-seat majority on 43% of the votes, and won last time with a majority of 66 on under 37% of the votes. This is the true scandal that needs to end.
With the polls suggesting neither Labour nor Conservative will have an overall majority this time, much speculation is put on us as to which party we would support. This question totally misses the point.
The point is that we tell the electorate what we stand for, and then, if there’s a hung Parliament, we look at the maths and see if a majority can be formed involving us and a party that is willing to embrace our four core policies: fair taxes, a greener economy, reform of education, and a new political system.
Yes, I want a hung Parliament, but not because it will help the Liberal Democrats – I’m not entirely sure that it would help us. I want a hung Parliament because it will be best for democracy and may lead us to a new era of cooperative government rather than the elective dictatorship we have now.
Yes, the City and the markets may go into panic mode the morning after an election that offers up no single-party winner. But that will focus the various minds, not just on the need to cooperate, but on our need for a properly written constitution so we have a stronger framework in which to work.
No wonder the latest opinion polls are saying there is popular support for a hung Parliament. The people appear to have a better sense of how the country should be run than the vested interests in the City whose concept of ‘a clear mandate for government’ is very different to mine.
Contrast that with the situation in this country where some sections of society are getting hysterical about the prospect that we could on 7 May have a hung Parliament. What is normal in most other countries appears to be a recipe for national disaster here.
So what’s the difference?
The difference is that we’re not used to different parties cooperating in government. This is not strange, when you think we haven’t had a formal coalition since 1945, or a peacetime coalition since the late 1930s. We had some cooperation between Labour and the Liberals in 1977-78, a short-lived arrangement that served the country well, even if it was disastrous for Liberal fortunes at the polls.
But it’s strange in another way. We have never had a government elected by a majority of those who voted! Maragaret Thatcher’s thumping majority of 144 seats in 1983 was achieved with 44% of the votes. Labour got in in 1997 with a 179-seat majority on 43% of the votes, and won last time with a majority of 66 on under 37% of the votes. This is the true scandal that needs to end.
With the polls suggesting neither Labour nor Conservative will have an overall majority this time, much speculation is put on us as to which party we would support. This question totally misses the point.
The point is that we tell the electorate what we stand for, and then, if there’s a hung Parliament, we look at the maths and see if a majority can be formed involving us and a party that is willing to embrace our four core policies: fair taxes, a greener economy, reform of education, and a new political system.
Yes, I want a hung Parliament, but not because it will help the Liberal Democrats – I’m not entirely sure that it would help us. I want a hung Parliament because it will be best for democracy and may lead us to a new era of cooperative government rather than the elective dictatorship we have now.
Yes, the City and the markets may go into panic mode the morning after an election that offers up no single-party winner. But that will focus the various minds, not just on the need to cooperate, but on our need for a properly written constitution so we have a stronger framework in which to work.
No wonder the latest opinion polls are saying there is popular support for a hung Parliament. The people appear to have a better sense of how the country should be run than the vested interests in the City whose concept of ‘a clear mandate for government’ is very different to mine.
Friday, 5 March 2010
IF WE DON’T TACKLE THINKING ON SALARIES, WE’LL NEVER GET OUT OF RECESSION
I’ve never listened to either 6 Music or the Asian Network, so if they’re axed I can’t say I’ll miss them. But I’m very angry about their impending demise.
The BBC is clearly keen to show it can cut back, which is good. I’m not going to argue the case for those two stations, because I don’t know the full picture, but it angers me that stations are being axed when the BBC is failing to deal with its core problem: the amount it pays on executive salaries and expenses.
The recent report into BBC pay showed 137 BBC executives are on £100,000 or more. That strikes me as a remarkably top-heavy organisation. The money being paid for ‘celebrity talent’ is another worry, though I won’t go down the Jonathan Ross road as I think even the BBC have realised that £6 million a year is too much.
And the expenses that are paid within the BBC are a scandal. I don’t know if the report that Alan Hansen is paid a taxi each way from his home in the north-west to London to be on ‘Match of the Day’ is true, but the trouble is it’s believable.
It would be wrong to have a go at the BBC alone. Bankers and Premiership footballers are on the kind of silly money that makes them lose touch with the real world. A former colleague of mine, writing in the Daily Telegraph, recently told of a meeting with the chairman of a prominent football club suffering financial woes. When asked why the club had got into such trouble, the chairman said he really wasn’t sure because they weren’t paying their players more than £12,000 a week. That’s well over £600,000 a year! If he thought this was prudent, no wonder he’s not sure why his club’s in difficulties.
There’s a section of society that has simply lost its connection with what it costs to live – and it’s dragging the rest of us down with it.
The average salary in this county is £30,000, and there are plenty who have to live on that. Of course we all want a bit more, and for most of us, hitting £50,000 by the time we’re 50 is a sign that we’re doing reasonably well. Unless you have an exceptional amount of responsibilities, £50,000 is the kind of salary we can all live on, with a couple of luxuries thrown in.
If some businesses can justify paying much more than that, then fine. But it must be justified! The problem is that pay increases have gone up in the good times and not come down in the bad. It has led to a situation where people’s salary is not what their job warrants but what they think they’re worth, which are two totally different things.
We need to stop, take stock, decide what is a reasonable salary for people in responsible jobs, and say that anything more than that has to be justified in terms of money they can bring in. If we fail to do that, we’ll never get properly out of recession, whatever the economic indicators say.
The BBC is clearly keen to show it can cut back, which is good. I’m not going to argue the case for those two stations, because I don’t know the full picture, but it angers me that stations are being axed when the BBC is failing to deal with its core problem: the amount it pays on executive salaries and expenses.
The recent report into BBC pay showed 137 BBC executives are on £100,000 or more. That strikes me as a remarkably top-heavy organisation. The money being paid for ‘celebrity talent’ is another worry, though I won’t go down the Jonathan Ross road as I think even the BBC have realised that £6 million a year is too much.
And the expenses that are paid within the BBC are a scandal. I don’t know if the report that Alan Hansen is paid a taxi each way from his home in the north-west to London to be on ‘Match of the Day’ is true, but the trouble is it’s believable.
It would be wrong to have a go at the BBC alone. Bankers and Premiership footballers are on the kind of silly money that makes them lose touch with the real world. A former colleague of mine, writing in the Daily Telegraph, recently told of a meeting with the chairman of a prominent football club suffering financial woes. When asked why the club had got into such trouble, the chairman said he really wasn’t sure because they weren’t paying their players more than £12,000 a week. That’s well over £600,000 a year! If he thought this was prudent, no wonder he’s not sure why his club’s in difficulties.
There’s a section of society that has simply lost its connection with what it costs to live – and it’s dragging the rest of us down with it.
The average salary in this county is £30,000, and there are plenty who have to live on that. Of course we all want a bit more, and for most of us, hitting £50,000 by the time we’re 50 is a sign that we’re doing reasonably well. Unless you have an exceptional amount of responsibilities, £50,000 is the kind of salary we can all live on, with a couple of luxuries thrown in.
If some businesses can justify paying much more than that, then fine. But it must be justified! The problem is that pay increases have gone up in the good times and not come down in the bad. It has led to a situation where people’s salary is not what their job warrants but what they think they’re worth, which are two totally different things.
We need to stop, take stock, decide what is a reasonable salary for people in responsible jobs, and say that anything more than that has to be justified in terms of money they can bring in. If we fail to do that, we’ll never get properly out of recession, whatever the economic indicators say.
Saturday, 20 February 2010
THE WIN:WIN OF GOOD FOOD THAT’S BEEN FAIRLY TRADED
It warmed the cockles of my heart, it did! I took my daughter to the ‘Fun & Safety’ event at Hailsham Children’s Centre during this half-term week, and there for all the kids to help themselves was a table full of fresh fruit: apples, bananas, melon and pineapple, all cut up into bite-size pieces.
So many of our society’s problems can be put down to children eating junk. Sure, a few sweets and chocolates are part of childhood, and the odd meal of processed food won’t do any harm.
But a range of ills from hyperactivity and short attention spans to early-onset diabetes are fed by the habit we have got into as a nation of giving our youngest citizens the worst start in life in terms of their diet.
That’s why it was so reassuring to see the fruit table, the contents of which had been provided by Waitrose. Kids love fruit – that was obvious from the way they devoured it, especially the boys. Of course most would prefer sweets if you offered the choice, and yes, there were a few mums who had brought sweets to hand to their offspring, but for most it wasn’t necessary.
The next trick is to get the fruit to be all fairly traded. That may sound like trying to gild the lily, but it’s a legitimate aspiration that’s being taken very seriously in Uckfield and Crowborough over the next fortnight.
‘Fairtrade Fortnight’ is the kind of thing that will pass most people by, largely because every week of the year is some cause’s week. But fair trade ought to be thought of as a sign of a civilised society every bit as much as having a public health service to protect us all in our hour of need.
Several years ago I researched, wrote and presented some newspaper articles and a short programme on the BBC World Service on the ethics of sports goods manufacture. I was shocked to find that a pair of branded trainers selling for $80 had earned the guy in Asia who’d made them less than $1. In other words, the other $79 was all middlemen, marketing and profits. OK, so $1 will buy a lot more in Malaysia or the Philippines than it does in America, but it was still a paltry fee.
That shouldn’t happen, and that’s what the fair trade system sets out to tackle. It’s not a perfect system, because the minimum wage in some countries can be pitifully low as governments strive to attract first-world investment. But it’s the best system we have, and it’s a lot better than leaving everything to unregulated markets.
Uckfield and Crowborough are both ‘fair trade towns’. That’s no idle designation – there are minimum levels of free trade products that have to be offered, so they can lose their status if they don’t keep up the required levels. That’s why it’s vital that people shopping in Uckfield and Crowborough ask for free trade products – it’s both morally right, and the sign of a civilised society.
So many of our society’s problems can be put down to children eating junk. Sure, a few sweets and chocolates are part of childhood, and the odd meal of processed food won’t do any harm.
But a range of ills from hyperactivity and short attention spans to early-onset diabetes are fed by the habit we have got into as a nation of giving our youngest citizens the worst start in life in terms of their diet.
That’s why it was so reassuring to see the fruit table, the contents of which had been provided by Waitrose. Kids love fruit – that was obvious from the way they devoured it, especially the boys. Of course most would prefer sweets if you offered the choice, and yes, there were a few mums who had brought sweets to hand to their offspring, but for most it wasn’t necessary.
The next trick is to get the fruit to be all fairly traded. That may sound like trying to gild the lily, but it’s a legitimate aspiration that’s being taken very seriously in Uckfield and Crowborough over the next fortnight.
‘Fairtrade Fortnight’ is the kind of thing that will pass most people by, largely because every week of the year is some cause’s week. But fair trade ought to be thought of as a sign of a civilised society every bit as much as having a public health service to protect us all in our hour of need.
Several years ago I researched, wrote and presented some newspaper articles and a short programme on the BBC World Service on the ethics of sports goods manufacture. I was shocked to find that a pair of branded trainers selling for $80 had earned the guy in Asia who’d made them less than $1. In other words, the other $79 was all middlemen, marketing and profits. OK, so $1 will buy a lot more in Malaysia or the Philippines than it does in America, but it was still a paltry fee.
That shouldn’t happen, and that’s what the fair trade system sets out to tackle. It’s not a perfect system, because the minimum wage in some countries can be pitifully low as governments strive to attract first-world investment. But it’s the best system we have, and it’s a lot better than leaving everything to unregulated markets.
Uckfield and Crowborough are both ‘fair trade towns’. That’s no idle designation – there are minimum levels of free trade products that have to be offered, so they can lose their status if they don’t keep up the required levels. That’s why it’s vital that people shopping in Uckfield and Crowborough ask for free trade products – it’s both morally right, and the sign of a civilised society.
Wednesday, 27 January 2010
THE ANGER AGAINST THE BANKS IS UNDERSTANDABLE, BUT THE SOLUTION IS MORE COMPLICATED
Don’t you just hate those bankers? They’re the parasites of our society, the folks who get bailed out by the government and then pay themselves massive bonuses. Aren’t they?
Well it’s not quite as simple as that. True, the banking world has played a big part in the mess we’re in by its reckless lending and paying out of obscene bonuses. And of course it’s galling when banks that were bailed out with public money are found to be still paying big bonuses just a few months after receiving state help.
But there’s a simple truth in all this – if bashing the banks were straight forward, you can be sure the government would have done it long ago.
The problem is that taxes from banking make such a sizeable contribution to the money governments have to spend – one estimate I read put it at 12 per cent – that if we bash the banks, we will find there’s less money available for many of the things we take for granted that the state currently funds.
So how do we get round the problem? The task is to find a solution that keeps the banks contributing to the economy without them enjoying a position where they effectively hold the government to ransom.
Labour’s approach has been to introduce a tax on bonuses. That sounds all very reasonable, except it doesn’t work as there are so many ways round it.
We’re not exactly sure what the Conservatives would do if they got into government. I can understand David Cameron keeping his cards close to his chest, but it does mean he’s asking voters to take a leap of faith in supporting his party, and given the close links between Conservatives and bankers, I have no confidence that any action a Tory government would take would amount to more than tokenism.
The Lib Dem approach is to concentrate on taxing bank profits, not bank bonuses. That way the overall operations of a bank get taxed rather than just bonuses. Apart from being fairer, it would have the additional benefit that we’d avoid discriminating against people working at the lower end of the banking industry who get a large part of their modest pay in bonuses.
We have other finance policies too that are relevant to the bank issue, such as breaking up the banks that are in state ownership so they don’t become massive units that can’t respond to changing conditions; insisting that state ownership should mean an obligation to lend to solid British companies; and closing tax loopholes for the very rich so everyone pays the amount of tax they should be paying.
Despite the understandable public anger, dealing with the banks is a balancing act. What the Liberal Democrats have is a policy that aims to build a banking system of the future that is viable for the country as well as the banks themselves. That is more constructive than policies that offer a sop to popular anger, or offer nothing of substance at all.
Well it’s not quite as simple as that. True, the banking world has played a big part in the mess we’re in by its reckless lending and paying out of obscene bonuses. And of course it’s galling when banks that were bailed out with public money are found to be still paying big bonuses just a few months after receiving state help.
But there’s a simple truth in all this – if bashing the banks were straight forward, you can be sure the government would have done it long ago.
The problem is that taxes from banking make such a sizeable contribution to the money governments have to spend – one estimate I read put it at 12 per cent – that if we bash the banks, we will find there’s less money available for many of the things we take for granted that the state currently funds.
So how do we get round the problem? The task is to find a solution that keeps the banks contributing to the economy without them enjoying a position where they effectively hold the government to ransom.
Labour’s approach has been to introduce a tax on bonuses. That sounds all very reasonable, except it doesn’t work as there are so many ways round it.
We’re not exactly sure what the Conservatives would do if they got into government. I can understand David Cameron keeping his cards close to his chest, but it does mean he’s asking voters to take a leap of faith in supporting his party, and given the close links between Conservatives and bankers, I have no confidence that any action a Tory government would take would amount to more than tokenism.
The Lib Dem approach is to concentrate on taxing bank profits, not bank bonuses. That way the overall operations of a bank get taxed rather than just bonuses. Apart from being fairer, it would have the additional benefit that we’d avoid discriminating against people working at the lower end of the banking industry who get a large part of their modest pay in bonuses.
We have other finance policies too that are relevant to the bank issue, such as breaking up the banks that are in state ownership so they don’t become massive units that can’t respond to changing conditions; insisting that state ownership should mean an obligation to lend to solid British companies; and closing tax loopholes for the very rich so everyone pays the amount of tax they should be paying.
Despite the understandable public anger, dealing with the banks is a balancing act. What the Liberal Democrats have is a policy that aims to build a banking system of the future that is viable for the country as well as the banks themselves. That is more constructive than policies that offer a sop to popular anger, or offer nothing of substance at all.
Wednesday, 6 January 2010
IF YOU'RE A FRIEND, VOTE FOR WHAT WE STAND FOR
The great tennis champion Steffi Graf once told me she had difficulty making friends. It wasn’t that there weren’t people wanting to be her friend – the trouble was working out who were genuine and who were just in it for the reflected glory.
I sympathised then, and I sympathise even more now. As Liberal Democrats, it seems everyone currently wants to be our friend, but there are two very different types of suitor.
The first are those who are attracted to what we stand for, who recognise that while Labour and Conservatives may cramp the centre ground of British politics, the Lib Dems do have something different to offer, something ‘radical’ in the true sense of the word (changing from the roots).
The second are those who think they might need our support after the general election, as a ‘hung Parliament’ looks a distinct possibility. Both David Cameron and Gordon Brown are making noises about how there isn’t really that much that divides the Lib Dems from the main parties, which most people rightly see as little more than a charm offensive in the hope that they can woo post-election Lib Dem support.
As a result, journalists are now desperate to know who the Lib Dems would support – whether in formal coalition or just in Commons votes – if there was a hung Parliament. The question is even seen as reasonable, especially by those whose primary motivation is to see Brown jettisoned as prime minister or Cameron never make it to No 10.
Well it isn’t reasonable, in fact it shows a lamentable failure to understand anything other than a two-party system.
The majority of European countries have coalition governments, and the feature of them is that, in the run-up to an election, all parties campaign as if they are going to form a government. Only after the election do they start doing the sums and seeing what arrangements can be made. Failure to do it that way means parties lose their identity.
That’s why Nick Clegg is quite right not to be falling for the political interviewers’ bait. He and the rest of us want to see a Lib Dem government. We’re realistic enough to know that it probably won’t happen after this election, and may take a generation or two to happen at all. But we believe in our policies to provide the kind of government Britain needs, and we’re not going to be knocked off track by those who want to know whether we’re more blue or more red.
We stand for fairer taxation, reform of the banking system, a better deal for primary school children, reducing the burden on small businesses, and making Britain carbon-neutral by 2050. In my view, that would make a very good government programme – and it’s neither blue nor red but gold!
If we have a hung Parliament, then the sums will be done to work out what alliances would create a working majority. If we hold the balance of power, we will see how other parties have fared, notably who the biggest party is.
But that’s for then. For now, we are asking for voters to vote for a Lib Dem government. That’s why the only friends we value are those who share our view of a socially, economically and environmentally fairer Britain.
I sympathised then, and I sympathise even more now. As Liberal Democrats, it seems everyone currently wants to be our friend, but there are two very different types of suitor.
The first are those who are attracted to what we stand for, who recognise that while Labour and Conservatives may cramp the centre ground of British politics, the Lib Dems do have something different to offer, something ‘radical’ in the true sense of the word (changing from the roots).
The second are those who think they might need our support after the general election, as a ‘hung Parliament’ looks a distinct possibility. Both David Cameron and Gordon Brown are making noises about how there isn’t really that much that divides the Lib Dems from the main parties, which most people rightly see as little more than a charm offensive in the hope that they can woo post-election Lib Dem support.
As a result, journalists are now desperate to know who the Lib Dems would support – whether in formal coalition or just in Commons votes – if there was a hung Parliament. The question is even seen as reasonable, especially by those whose primary motivation is to see Brown jettisoned as prime minister or Cameron never make it to No 10.
Well it isn’t reasonable, in fact it shows a lamentable failure to understand anything other than a two-party system.
The majority of European countries have coalition governments, and the feature of them is that, in the run-up to an election, all parties campaign as if they are going to form a government. Only after the election do they start doing the sums and seeing what arrangements can be made. Failure to do it that way means parties lose their identity.
That’s why Nick Clegg is quite right not to be falling for the political interviewers’ bait. He and the rest of us want to see a Lib Dem government. We’re realistic enough to know that it probably won’t happen after this election, and may take a generation or two to happen at all. But we believe in our policies to provide the kind of government Britain needs, and we’re not going to be knocked off track by those who want to know whether we’re more blue or more red.
We stand for fairer taxation, reform of the banking system, a better deal for primary school children, reducing the burden on small businesses, and making Britain carbon-neutral by 2050. In my view, that would make a very good government programme – and it’s neither blue nor red but gold!
If we have a hung Parliament, then the sums will be done to work out what alliances would create a working majority. If we hold the balance of power, we will see how other parties have fared, notably who the biggest party is.
But that’s for then. For now, we are asking for voters to vote for a Lib Dem government. That’s why the only friends we value are those who share our view of a socially, economically and environmentally fairer Britain.
Tuesday, 22 December 2009
WE CAN’T BLAME THE DEVELOPING NATIONS FOR COPENHAGEN’S FAILURE UNTIL WE DO MORE
There was a terrible irony in the fact that the recent cold snap came over the weekend that the Copenhagen climate conference ended in failure.
The anger that many people, including me, felt when the world’s leaders failed to reach a legally binding agreement was totally justified. At the level of the negotiations, the fault did not lie with the developed nations. The EU made a reasonable offer, Barack Obama took America further than it had ever gone before, and even Gordon Brown pushed for a deal harder than his more climatically telegenic predecessor ever did.
But we would be fooling ourselves if we swallowed our own propaganda that the fault lay entirely with the developing nations. And the cold snap showed us up.
Somehow we can’t accept that the weather sometimes slows us down. We have to do everything just as normal, so we get out our snow ploughs, we crank up the heating, we drive on icy roads causing accidents and dramatically increasing our fuel consumption.
Some of that can be justified, especially for emergency service workers, and for those making sure more vulnerable members of society can survive. But how many shops had their doors wide open in sub-zero temperatures? It would be easier to say how many hadn’t. And why was all the grit used first for roads and only afterwards - if at all - for pavements? Clearly motorists are more important than pedestrians.
I went to my daughter’s school play. It was about climate change awareness, and was exemplary in the message it promoted. Then, when it was all over, two doors – one on either side of the hall – were wedged open and the hall’s warmth was crushed by an invasion of freezing cold air. After that message!
It reminds me of that comical scene at the start of Captain Corelli’s Mandolin. The priest is locked in his church, the loo is out of bounds and he’s desperate for a leak, so he drinks a bottle of wine so he can pee into the empty bottle, only to find that the wine provides a new call of nature. Our modern lifestyle has created pressures on our climate that are leading to extreme weather conditions, yet our response is a course of action that uses more energy and emits more climate changing gases!
Set against this background, is it any wonder the developing nations are suspicious about our willingness to address our lifestyle in a way that will seriously reduce climate emissions? They don’t want to forego their material prosperity while we’re still unwilling to compromise on ours – and frankly, why should they? Yet we need countries like China, India and Brazil to cut down on their emissions, or there’s no chance of limiting warming to two degrees Celsius.
That’s why the 10:10 campaign has caught the spirit of the times. It’s far from perfect, but it says ‘We must do something now’ and calls on people to reduce their own personal greenhouse gas emissions in 2010 by 10%. I have signed up to it, and I hope you can too.
Because without some major gesture, there is no way we are going to get the developing nations to make the concessions needed for the world to have a truly meaningful, legally binding climate agreement.
The anger that many people, including me, felt when the world’s leaders failed to reach a legally binding agreement was totally justified. At the level of the negotiations, the fault did not lie with the developed nations. The EU made a reasonable offer, Barack Obama took America further than it had ever gone before, and even Gordon Brown pushed for a deal harder than his more climatically telegenic predecessor ever did.
But we would be fooling ourselves if we swallowed our own propaganda that the fault lay entirely with the developing nations. And the cold snap showed us up.
Somehow we can’t accept that the weather sometimes slows us down. We have to do everything just as normal, so we get out our snow ploughs, we crank up the heating, we drive on icy roads causing accidents and dramatically increasing our fuel consumption.
Some of that can be justified, especially for emergency service workers, and for those making sure more vulnerable members of society can survive. But how many shops had their doors wide open in sub-zero temperatures? It would be easier to say how many hadn’t. And why was all the grit used first for roads and only afterwards - if at all - for pavements? Clearly motorists are more important than pedestrians.
I went to my daughter’s school play. It was about climate change awareness, and was exemplary in the message it promoted. Then, when it was all over, two doors – one on either side of the hall – were wedged open and the hall’s warmth was crushed by an invasion of freezing cold air. After that message!
It reminds me of that comical scene at the start of Captain Corelli’s Mandolin. The priest is locked in his church, the loo is out of bounds and he’s desperate for a leak, so he drinks a bottle of wine so he can pee into the empty bottle, only to find that the wine provides a new call of nature. Our modern lifestyle has created pressures on our climate that are leading to extreme weather conditions, yet our response is a course of action that uses more energy and emits more climate changing gases!
Set against this background, is it any wonder the developing nations are suspicious about our willingness to address our lifestyle in a way that will seriously reduce climate emissions? They don’t want to forego their material prosperity while we’re still unwilling to compromise on ours – and frankly, why should they? Yet we need countries like China, India and Brazil to cut down on their emissions, or there’s no chance of limiting warming to two degrees Celsius.
That’s why the 10:10 campaign has caught the spirit of the times. It’s far from perfect, but it says ‘We must do something now’ and calls on people to reduce their own personal greenhouse gas emissions in 2010 by 10%. I have signed up to it, and I hope you can too.
Because without some major gesture, there is no way we are going to get the developing nations to make the concessions needed for the world to have a truly meaningful, legally binding climate agreement.
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