Climate Crazy

Being naturally inclined to optimisim, I am loath to write anything today since three stories which have left me feeling gloomy.... But here is an attempt anyway.

There was a time climate change was becoming something I was feeling rather sick of hearing about frankly - in my mind there was no question that we must act now to preserve not only our future but the future of those in other parts of the world who are already suffering from things like the effects of desertification.

Then something changed; a couple of actually unconnected emails from Climate Scientists at the University of East Anglia became all the amunition climate sceptics needed to excuse the human race of acting responsibly towards the environment. Given proper context these emails were nowhere near as damning as newspapers wanted to suggest, but the media ignored this and public opinion has been set back years.

Perhaps as a result, a series of disheartening stories keeps appearing:

1) Professor Lovelock - famed for his 'Gaia theories', said on the Today programme (31st March) that we cannot do anything to save our planet and so we might as well enjoy life whilst we can. He might not consider it like this, but regardless of climate change, this is fundamentally a rally call for continued reliance on oil ignoring the environmental impacts of draining our earth dry, causing animals to become extinct.

2) Jon Holmes - This was not even a story, it was part of a throwaway speech on BBC Radio Four's Now Show. His totally unbalanced and cynical account of climate change and his declaration that we should do nothing about it riled me to the point of activism. OK, so it is perhaps a rather pathetic form of activism in that it involves boycotting the Now Show as well as Holmes's 6 Music programme (which actually until this point I had become rather fond of), and also writing into the show to point out the fundamental lack of balance in what Holmes said.

3) Barack Obama - this last story was the announcement that drilling of oil will be permitted off the U.S. coast, apart from the protected area in Alaska. This was an apparent capitulation to lobbyists in return for their cooperation on a climate deal in Congress, at the cost of many miles of coastline and probably many animal species too.

Before I bore you please take this shocking stat into account before you decide not to act too: a Select Committee report has received evidence showing that up to 50,000 people die prematurely in Britain because of the effects of air pollution, that includes 8,000 in London alone. Besides the huge increase in asthma cases, such pollution has links to chronic bronchitis, heart disease and even cancer.

So, I am not asking you to subscribe to the impending doom scenario to want to act - it remains a fact however that we are using up our resources, destroying our rainforests, causing our children to die early as they inhale fumes, making life even more difficult for poor communities, killing off animal species that can never be brought back to life.
If these are not reasons to act, then I do not know what is.

David Cameron: Losing the Plot Over Gay Rights

Flustered, red faced, even confused, David Cameron in his interview with the Gay Times, intended to show the Tories have move forward on the issue on the homosexuality, but the leader made such a hash of the questions he came close to stopping the interview altogether.

David Cameron stated that he would like free votes for MEPs and MPs on matters of human rights where possible, but then stumbled when interviewer Martin Popplewell pointed out that this did not with square up with his declared commitment to homosexuality as a fundamental human right. Realising that he should have said MPs would be required to vote according to the party line, Mr. Cameron looked down at the floor and conceded:

"Do you know... can we stop for a second, I really want to answerthese questions... either can we do a TV interview or a press interview. I would almost like to start from scratch."

In the end, after a short break to compose himself, Mr. Cameron was able to carry on, however Ben Bradshaw, Labour Minister for Culture, Media and Sport wasted no time in labelling the mistake as a "gaffe".

The whole debacle started when the interviewer probed the Conservative leader on a vote in the European Parliament, in which his Conservative MEPs voted against a resolution condemning a Lithuanian law, which is widely seen as deeply homophobic.

Not only is this cited as pointing to a flawed party modernisation process, some speculate that that MEPs' vote could have been influenced by the Conservative's partners in the 'European Conservatives and Reformists' group' in the EU Parliament, a group which includes ultra-conservative parties. David Cameron received much flak for joining up with parties, like the Latvian party 'For Fatherland and Freedom' seen by most of Europe as extreme. It appears his decision to align with them will repeatedly come back to bite him.

Too hung up on a hung parliament!

(c) Liberal Democrats

Hung Parliament- the buzz word of the decade so far (okay so we've only had three months of 2010) has been discussed to death by the newspapers, to the extent that even after doing in depth interviews with just about every publication, Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg always finds next day's headline describing him as 'kingmaker' or repeating that the party will not accept cabinet positions.

Nick Clegg is in danger of becoming entirely one dimensional - even the politically engaged are unlikely to remember the four key Lib Dem policies given the obsessive attention the prospect of a Hung Parliament brings - Vince Cable even told businesses off for panicking on the Andrew Marr Show when the stock market went shaky with the prospect of an unstable government.


Strategy formulation from here on in will not be an easy, on the one hand they could consider it a bonus to receive coverage of their leader at all considering the struggle which the Lib Dems normally go through to gain enough publicity so that people at least know who the leader is. However, it would be better for Clegg to try and carve out some other policy area to champion - much like Vince has managed to do, being the politician all the broadcasters turn to on the subject of the economy.


Education could be the key - at the moment lazy journalism suggests that their policy is the same as the Tories, but actually the idea of free schools is rejected by the party. My gut feeling is that investment in education is absolutely vital to the future of this nation, if we fail to educate the future generation then our economy will suffer badly as a result - other countries are taking this view could be all the better for it. The idea of a pupil premium for disadvantaged children is promising, but he needs to go further - for example, the proposals to cut huge amounts of funding to Universities should NOT be supported by the party.


The manifesto will of course be the test in terms of more detailed policy, the televised debates could be a great wild card in his favour, but to give the party a unique selling point during the 'phoney war' before the campaign proper begins, at his Conference speech and beyond, education should be key message coming from the leader.