I’m getting a bit bored of the argument that climate change doesn’t exist (or more accurately that Man doesn’t make any difference to it), and of various people pledging to leave all their heating on full blast, buy the biggest-engined car they can find, and running all their taps at the same time. That’s a juvenile response. Fair enough if you don’t agree with the science. I don’t believe in some things either. But realistically – why wouldn’t you conserve energy, water, clean air and beautiful countryside if you can?
You don’t have to live like a monk to help clean up our environment; and surely Edmund Burke’s concept of a partnership between generations is a better expression of Conservatism than all-out single-minded individualism?
This year’s Reith Lectures focus on ‘A New Politics of the Common Good’. The first is about the moral dimensions we apply to markets.
In the first lecture, Professor Michael Sandel discusses how humans use markets in a moral way. One of the main things he talks about is the environment; he argues against a carbon emissions trading scheme because all this does is give some companies/countries a licence to continue to pollute, while paying what they see as a valid cost of doing business – ie buying credits from other companies/countries who reduce their emissions in return. His argument is that unless there is a moral or social stigma attached to pollution, a market solution such as a trading scheme doesn’t work.
While I absolutely agree with this, I would also go a step further. Because until it is economically unviable to continue to pollute, it will remain acceptable business practice for (some) companies/countries to do so. Therefore the obvious answer, to me at least, is to have a sliding scale both in cost of the credits, and an opposite one in volume of credit available; as the credits get more expensive, fewer of them are available.
This is why government – indeed, intergovernmental – action is so critical. Yes, individuals can install solar panels, paint your roof white, use greywater etc – these things are all valuable, and can contribute in their own way. But the biggest emissions-generating activity is – of course – manufacturing, and that’s where a trading scheme should come in. I’m not arguing for a hugely punitive regime to start off with – manufacturers are having as tough a time as anyone at the moment. But, as I have argued before, the old ways of doing things have clearly let us down; the opportunity for change lies in adversity, and if we don’t do it – who will?
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I was recently briefly in Switzerland, where I was reminded that they started looking after their environment about 50 years ago. Their reasons were economic – tourism is,and was, their second biggest foreign exchange earner, and people will not pay to see a poluted, untidy and litter strewn place. As an aside, their railway system was completely electrified by 1904. Makes you think….