In advance of tonight's climate change election debate it's worth summarising the manifesto state of play. In a nutshell it is this:
- Conservatives: Net zero emissions by 2050, as under current UK law. In effect, it is assumed the issue has been addressed.
- Labour: Aiming to achieve the “substantial majority” of emissions reductions by 2030,
with subsidiary targets, such as aiming to achieve “net-zero-carbon food production
in Britain by 2040”. - Lib Dems: net zero emissions by 2045, with a reduction in emissions of 75% by 2030 and 93% by 2040.
- SNP: net zero target by 2045, 75% by 2030 and 90% by 2040.
- Green: A Green New Deal (GND) policy package, including net zero by 2030.
The differences are stark and significant. There will be much to debate. Including the empty chairs.
For an analysis of the differences, this is worth reading.
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It’s useful to understand where human conceptions of nature come from historically which still inform a variety of attitudes to the climate change crisis. Jedediah Purdy from Harvard University has written about this in a very thought provoking and debunking book. Although its written from the viewpoint of how Americans have perceived nature in recent centuries they got a lot of this from European thinking. His central argument is you can’t take away politics from thinking about nature. Indeed it’s true to say “politics” has been embedded in nature from the very start of life on the planet:-
“After Nature: A Politics for the Anthropocene”
https://www.amazon.co.uk/After-Nature-Anthropocene-Jedediah-Purdy/dp/0674979869/ref=sr_1_1?qid=1574939499&refinements=p_27%3AJedediah+Purdy&s=books&sr=1-1&text=Jedediah+Purdy
George Monbiot in the Guardian on 27/11/19 has a good article on this.
Anyone in any doubt about the urgency of climate action should read the article “Climate tipping points – too risky to bet against” in Nature 27/11/19.
Interesting list. And items 2,3,and 4 are utterly meaningless. Because the appalling Tories will win the forthcoming election, the mendacious racist bumbling egotistical hypocrite Johnson will be PM, and the inevitable Tory Government majority will be sufficient to make any policies promised by the other parties as likely to be fulfilled as Arlene Foster is likely to be Pope. The anti-Johnson-anti-Brexit parties, representing the views of the majority of the electorate of England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, are doing their level best to ensure that Johnson becomes the PM and leads a government with a handsome majority enabling him to “get Brexit done” – and minimise the rate of advance to a zero carbon economy to a date when many, perhaps most on this blog, will be safely dead leaving the upcoming generation to deal with a chaotic world and lethal hostile climate. I was at husting held in Buckingham University last night. This is Mr Bercow’s old constituency that normally would show a substantial majority for the Tories. This election, however, I am certain the Tories could be defeated and Buckingham returnb an anti-Johnson-anti-Brexit majority and MP. Stephen Dorrell, ex-one nation Conservative, a decent humane man, a remainer, and very sound on social, economic and environmental issues, is the strong candidate for the Lib Dems; he really could win. Labour are fielding a good candidate too, but realistically, Labour could never win this constituency even if standing alone without any other party entering the fray. Not a chance. Never. But they are fielding a candidate, a decent indepndent minded socialist, and what is the result? – a divided anti Tory vote. The inevitable consequence is that the Tory – “Get Brexit Done, Bring the Country Togrether, Respect the Democratic Vote in the Referendum, Making Good Progress in Controlling Carbon Emmissions, NHS safe in Tory Hands, Corbyn a Threat to National Security, Labour will Bring Economic Chaos blah blah blah” – the Tory whose policies I abominate is going to win with perhaps 45% of the votes cast, while the opposition parties will together poll c55% of the vote and have to stand glumly and uselessly on the platform while the smirking Tory smugly listens to the result announced and makes his acceptance speech and thanks the police etc. And that is happening all over the country, And the Tories will win. And the anti-Tories representing the majority of the electorate will languish on the opposition benches while the new government wrecks the country and further impoverishes the already poor. But maybe, maybe, we will get a zero carbon economy in 2050 as promised by the mendacious fat fraud. But don’t rely on it.
This was pretty good:
https://www.carbonbrief.org/election-2019-what-the-manifestos-say-on-energy-and-climate-change?
Looking at the Tories policies – long on sound bites short on detail & in some areas, deranged. For example, painting the UK as an off-shore wind leader – only true in terms of the number of off-shore farms but consider that circa 80% of the off-shore farms are controlled by non-UK companies & with the exception of the Vestas blade factory on the IoW – nothing of substance is made in the UK. Still what would one expect from a party led by a mendacious blonde fatberg.
In fairness to Labour – they have provided some detail.
I like the Greens but don’t think they have quite grasped that the Uk will needs a de-carbed UK industry to replace fossil generation with renewables. Buying components from for example steel plants in Indonesia (monopiles for an EdF off-shore farm in the UK) is not “a good look”. This is not about re-industrialisation but simply ensuring that there is some basic capacity within the Uk to “make stuff” – said capacity having been eroded over 40 years by tory & tory-lite parties..
Politics is difficult and I honour the politicians and commentators who are doing their best to wrestle with the issues.
That said, our food supply is now uncertain because insect pollinators are being killed by our practices. Extra carbon dioxide from burning diesel, petrol, coal and gas has made the planet hotter and melted some of the Arctic ice and every ice mass is getting smaller. But white ice … bounces heat from the sun … back into space … until it is gone. Then, as well as extra CO2 creating more heat, less ice is adding even more heat.
The climate has changed already and the rate of change is accelerating.
Dangers for us are a thousand times worse than for those who feared Hitler’s tanks.
If enacted, green-new-deal-type policies will represent a massive change, but the science tells us that many of them are 30 years too late. There is no no time for growth and the inevitable growth of consequent emissions – which need to head for zero now.
So, policies such as these should be under discussion: holiday flying to be forbidden — unilaterally; other nations will follow; energy rationed; housing space limited; and consumerism denounced as the child killer that it is.
If you think this too strong, you may eventually remember this when sea storms wash over our coastal communites — as they will … Sooner rather than later unless action is taken on a scale which will fundamentally affect every one of us.
Will MPs be loyal to their party or to the science?
Just in case my data is challenged see my guest post on 3 January this year: https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2019/01/03/data-for-a-green-new-deal/
Forbes (22 October): No One Seemed To Notice Greta Thunberg’s Critique Of The Green New Deal. “The climate and ecological crisis is beyond party politics. And our main enemy is not our political opponents. It is physics. And we cannot make ‘deals’ with physics.”
“I seem to be surrounded by fairytales. All across the political spectrum making up bedtime stories … about how we are going to fix everything …
It’s time to face the reality, the facts. And the science doesn’t mainly speak of ‘great opportunities … It tells of unspoken human sufferings, which will get worse the longer we delay action.” … Forbes: To me, Greta’s most important superpower is her integrity … she appears in the company of lions of non-violence, endurance and compassion. …
But she doesn’t want our praise. She wants us to take real action. Let’s do.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffmcmahon/2019/09/22/no-one-seemed-to-notice-greta-thunbergs-critique-of-the-green-new-deal/?fbclid=IwAR3sfoYPEktlYg6wcsI0sEmmMnB2P5gshU6GdFrhmp6De7pzk4hx7pqRAz8#597d52bb38da