I take exception to the illogicality of our Government’s Climate Change Bill,when presented with the fact that we are now using the very outlets that we are complaining of, concerning climate change, to create carbon emissions on our behalf to supply us with the goods we purchase. This is fatuous! As a nation, with only 0.6 % of the world’s population, in a physically small country, consequently reducing travel distances, with a reasonably low standard of emissions already, it beggars reason to even consider that the policies that the government is proposing are likely to make any significant difference in the rate of change, when placed against the recalcitrant attitudes inherent in the more populated and larger countries for the foreseeable future. Now is not the time.
I believe that this Bill is a purposeful distraction, because no intelligent person could put it forward with any moral logic. I fear with all the depression in stock markets throughout the world, with our immense debt, and our reliance on the stock market to stay afloat, that on top of our current tax burden, this latest proposal will not only produce hardship intrinsically, but could tip the scales to national financial ruin. In the light of our failing infrastructure, child illiteracy, overburdened penal system and other shortfalls, the money could be better spent on these deficiencies.
I believe that if ever there was a case for a referendum, this is it.
There are at least two arguments in favour of mandating a reduction in our emissions that I can think of off the top of my head.
The first is that when other nations eventually catch up, we will already have the know-how and so can flog them the new equipment they’ll need for their cars, power stations etc. Other EU countries are going that way too, and that’s about 7% percent of global population, not 0.6%.
The second is that if we mandate that everything sold here be low-emissions, then we are effectively mandating that companies everywhere make low-emissions products. It would presumably be in their interests to make only one version of their widget, so they’ll sell low emissions products *everywhere*. You can see this already in a related field – that being the EU’s ban on lead (and a few other substances) in electronics. Manufacturers throughout the world are abandoning those substances because it’s not cost-effective for them to maintain two seperate product lines, nor can they afford to stop selling to the EU.
Not that I’ve actually read the bill yet, you understand 🙂