This blog is closed and has moved to http://Charlottegore.com. See you there!
I feel a bit like I've had an encounter with Bugs Bunny. A big smooch on the lips and, while stunned, I realise I've been handed a stick of ACME dynamite which, inevitably explodes leaving me covered in soot but otherwise alive.Alix Mortimer has (probably quite rightly) given me a bit of a slapping down for my post demanding the end to Green Taxes.
Okay, I hold my hands up. I wasn't very constructive. I was far more focused on how that particular article came across and how warped it made our priorities seem.
But I have to agree with her about appealing to the trend setters, innovators and opinion formers in society. This is exactly what is needed for the Liberal Democrats to progress. Most visibly, we seem to suffer a notable lack of commentators, columnists and newspaper editors that vocally support our party - the only people who are really in a position to express their own political beliefs.
Of course, if you're writing for a Tory paper, supporting the Lib Dems (unless there's a tactical advantage for the Tories) could cost you your livelihood.
But what about the Independent? What about the Guardian? It strikes me that there must be some high profile writers afraid of how their gushing over the Labour Party will be damaging their reputation and credibility. Who wants to write a pro-Labour story these days?
Now, the post I wrote the other day, on Green Taxes, which I compared to Labour's Clause 4, is what's gained me the dynamite. And yes, I know I'm in a distinct minority in this party, but I really don't like the Environment being front and centre and at the heart of our flagship policies. It just makes us seem too narrow in our focus.
I'm also concerned that the measures we're proposing have no quantifiable or measurable benefits. Saying we're going to spend the money on X doesn't change the fact that we can't really know what impact it will actually have on the planet, and worse people's deepening cynicism and fear that any savings we make will be wiped out by China or any other growing economy. Unless you can prove you can make a difference, and that the concequences of not acting are catastrophic, most people will shrug and say they're willing to take their chances. We're fighting a "I'll be dead by then" mentality where modernity is in competition with the future, and the future can fend for itself.
It's not to say that I don't care about the environment. It seems inevitable that for humanity to guarantee it's survival it needs to end dependence on finite resources. It strikes me that this is a technological challenge first - materials and energy that can be recycled and made from renewable sources.
People seem to say that Free Markets have failed the environment, and that they'll destroy the planet because the cost to the planet is ultimately passed onto future generations.
So, if this is true, and it is impossible for free markets to actually deal with this problem then perhaps the solution is to replace value added tax on consumers with import tarriffs based on the level of CO2 emitted by the country of origin. Environmental Protectionism, if you will.
I really feel queasy even suggesting such a policy, but it's just about the only Green Tax that I think would actually provide an incentive on producers to think renewable.
The whole protectionism element of it scares me, but how else can ENvironment Harm ever really be taken into account? Alas this problem is too big for me. I'm no policy wonk but I can't help but feel that the public would support international action a lot more than unilateral, localised action that really wouldn't amount to much more than a hill of beans.
Genuinely interested in people's thoughts on this.
This blog is closed and has moved to http://Charlottegore.com. See you there!
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2 comments:
Gosh, I wouldn't go so far as to say we need to end dependence on finite resources. In fact I think it is a historical accident rather than compelling logic that has caused the environmental movement to see its origins in the Club of Rome, which was principally concerned with "resources" "running out" (resulting in a big recession), not trees or whales or clean air or global warming.
We need to put the brakes on climate change, and to adapt to it to the extent that it is unstoppable. We need to limit the further loss of biodiversity - to reach a milestone at some point before too long where we stop losing biodiversity altogether while there is still quite a lot left. We need..., er, no, that's about it. It would be nice to have cleaner air etc, but there is not the same downward trend there.
Not simple, not cheap, but achievable, if we put "resources", finite or otherwise, to good use.
There are a lot of problems with the debate around green taxes and the environment in general. I recently saw Tim Harford speak (the Undercover Economist) and he pointed out that a few years ago scientists believed that airplanes weren't emitting too much carbon because of the altitude they flew at. Now they think differently. There is a lot of conventional wisdom that needs challenging. Airmiles is a good example. Packing in lots of food, wrapping it in plastic, turns out to be more environmentally sound, than the trips we all make to the supermarket. When the good arrive at the supermarket they get stripped of their plastic wrapping and that is thrown away so as not to offend customers who then put the vegetables or fruit in plastic bags to take home. And out of the original warapping they don't last as long, thus causing more food to be imported with more wrapping... So we need to think hard about what we do and need a lot more information to make the right decisions. Harford favoured a carbon tax as a way of seeing how behaviours changed and identifying what people really need and will pay for and what companies really need to do and will thus pay a tax and what they can innovate with. Thus, the principles of the market in taxation.
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