This morning was absolutely beautiful, one of those luminous, clear mornings you only see starting cold, frosty Winter days.
Now you will not often hear me saying this as I am not an early bird, but I was privileged to be up and out just as dawn was breaking. Boris, my Irish Water Spaniel, is a young dog yet and cannot comprehend why anyone would want to stay in bed after the first bird call of a morning.
This morning gives credence to Boris' views. Dawn broke as a spectacular wash of reds and warm orange on a backdrop of a clear blue sky and the silhouette of the village. It was a view , I thought to myself, that would have recognised and enjoyed by the inhabitants of the village two or three hundred years ago.
Except for the vapour trails that is.
I counted sixteen easily this morning at seven a.m. Our skies are full
of the transport system that has the most proflic emissions and the
thing I cannot understand is why our governments encourage this?
Take the UK for example.... Being a UK citizen I can only really discuss the UK with any authority. Tony Blair is keen on the environment we are led to believe. His policies espouse "green" taxes - recently the "airport tax" was doubled. It remains to be seen whether this additional revenue will be used for the betterment of the environment or if it will just disappear into the "black hole" at the centre of the treasury.
Further evidence of the UK governments' green credentials came this week with the launch of an official website about green eating and how unseasonal vegetables and meat production is damaging the environment. All true and laudable educational efforts.
But they are missing the big opportunity whilst fiddling about on the periphery. They are like a man in a sinking row-boat who puts on his raincoat instead of fixing the leak!
The airlines pay no duty on fuel. That's right , none. How else could it be economically viable to fly fresh flowers out of season from Africa for UK supermarket shelves? The economics are again skewed. The businesses, in this example the supermarkets and the Air frieght line are given a significant advantage by not paying the fuel duty that other users pay. In the UK we pay around 80p in every pound spent on petrol as duty.
This duty levied by the government pays for roads schools and ( allegedly ) transport infrastructure.
By not paying duty on aircraft fuel, business is gaining a huge benefit from the commons. Is it really worth while, in example, polluting our common atmosphere upon which we all depend and using up resources that have taken millions of years to create just for fresh flowers in winter that last a few days?
Business is making big profit from squandering our finite natural capital and and paying nothing for the "tradegy of the commons" they are creating. Of course it is us who buy the flowers. We need to make informed decisions about the things we buy so that consumer demand, which business follows relentlessly, will ensure the environment is safe. So I don't buy flowers.
But why does the government not put duty on aviation fuel? The aviation fuel for petrol engines private pilots buy is taxed just like car fuel, but why not aviation jet fuel? The governmenst argument runs like this. No gevernments tax aviation fuel. If the UK were the only government to tax aviatoin fuel the airlaines would just fill up somewhere else. We cannot take unilateral action.
Well that is just rubbish. When it suits them ( or rather their paymasters ) they are quite fond of taking unilateral action and "showing international leadership". Iraq is a prime example. The government belived it was taking the lead by unilaterally invading Iraq along with the USA.
Show some international leadership now - be the first to levy duty on aviation fuel! The wholsale destruction of our world is an issue that needs clear and decisive leadership now. I doubt if the UK government will do anything but piffle around the edges to make themselves look good. They don't have the spine to do anything else.
