According to the polls once again the Green Party will poll badly. There is little appetite for their attacks on cars, gas boilers, industrial activities in the U.K. and the domestic oil and gas industry.
The Conservatives have been changing their policy, Â accepting that the public is not willing to buy heat pumps and electric cars on the scale Greens think necessary. They have shifted back dates for transition though left in place taxes on car companies that sell too many petrol and diesel vehicles.
Labour have backed an improbable idea of closing down all our gas fired power stations by 2030 but have cancelled the idea of ending gas boilers by 2035.
Reform say they would stop the spending on net zero transition as they do not support this.
Lib Demâs are closer to the Greens but wish to talk about other things. They major on being against sewage discharges to rivers, offering fines on companies and regulation which we already have as their answer!
Many voters think the climate does change but are not ready or able to buy electric cars and heat pumps. They are concerned if the U.K. closes down its industries and oil and gas extraction only to rely on imports based on fossil fuels.
So the road to net zero is on the ballot paper. Will it impact the overall result?
June 26, 2024
Good morning.
Not ‘changed’ Sir John but ‘modified’. All the Conservatives have done is to take their foot of the accelerator pedal a little bit. That cliff edge we are heading for is still there.
Nice play on words but you really should know us here better đ
To answer your question about whether ‘Nut Zero’ will affect the vote ? No ! No more than Russia / Ukraine will. That is because neither will have an impact until after the election. If people could see what is coming around the corner (ie Black / Brown outs and conscription into a war with Russia) I think the LibLabCON will be pretty much wiped out. But people, alas, cannot so we will get the government we deserve and not need.
June 26, 2024
From what Iâve read it seems that EVs ( as we have been saying on here for ever ) just arenât viable at any level and now we are not likely to even have ICE cars. Manufacturers pulling out of the U.K. because of pro EV legislation. Vauxhall I think.
What utter folly to scrap the old before testing the new properly!
Unless no car at all was always the plan?
June 26, 2024
Sir J’s headline title is spot on. NZ is THE most expensive project in this nation’s history, except war. It is madness we are not analysing it, and challenging it, every which way. It is THE reason I’m going to vote Reform, all the others are bent on national bankruptcy.
June 26, 2024
Eustice made it clear recently that we should eat less meat! No we should not. Tory party promised farmers funding once out of EU cap. Another lie and broken promise. Tory party got rid of red diesel making food production more expensive, it pays farmers our taxes Not to grow food! Tory party has given away fishing grounds and to make it permanent linked our fishing to EU energy. Increased inter connectors with EU to make UK dependent on EU and prevent divergence. EU environment locked in to prevent divergence.
Now the Tory party has effectively legalised shop lifting adding food costs to all our bills! Everyone is talking about witnessing shop lifting, telling staff to be told it is store policy not to engage them! Police will not attend u less the amount is ÂŁ200. Who gave the police the right to set limits on what thefts they will attend? Yet hundreds of them, 900 in Met, sit behind desks watching for hate crime on line! Young people allowed to die from knife crime on a daily basis but the the priority is non hate crime!
Tory party effectively legalised drugs, knife crime through banning stop and search but hammer motorists at every turn!
Strange how the unnecessary wars ie Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya and now Ukraine have no bearing on net stupid! Worse loss of life, loss of limbs and wasting billions of our taxes mean nothing to Tory or Labour MPs. Has Sunak openly declared war on Russia or still doing it on the quiet? UK still buying Russian oil and gas via India! Nord Stream gas line went ahead to Germany irrespective of alleged sanctions. Stop the war it will not bring regime change of Putin. I note still no action against China.
Encourages illegal and legal migrants by the million each year, against promises to cut it for 14 years, but somehow they do not need transport, food, housing, education, waste, water etc.
Tory party epitomises everything wrong in society. Just get out. Next oust Labour for all the same reasons. Starting with their manifesto to join EU defence ie give away our military and foreign policy to the EU! The rogue parliament needs ousting. I hope all the Labour voters will mirror all Tory voters and oust the lot.
June 26, 2024
Battery explosion in South Korea kills 22, not reported by MSM.
Reply It was reported by some
June 26, 2024
They certainly are rather a fire risk, and very hard to put out once alight. Do we really want tall tower blocks full of bike and scooter batteries all recharging in many of the flats. Often recharging even when the flat is unoccupied so no one even to raise the alarm? Or RORO ferries (or the channel tunnel shuttle trains full of EV cars? You are already banned from taking electric skooters on Tubes and from charging electronic equipment on aircraft.
EV cars need far more parking spacing for safety – so car parks can then only take perhaps half the number of cars per M2 of car park. Perhaps halving the value of the car park asset. Better half than nothing after a fire of say 300 cars though. Hard to see how they would put out an EV car fire on a packed ferry hold. Unless they can drop it over the side!
June 26, 2024
Often these batteries, connectors and chargers will have been damaged in crashes or with normal wear and tear too as they age.
June 26, 2024
and the battery recycling fire in glasgow this last week – it took ten fire engines and 50 firefighters to control
June 26, 2024
It seems no car for plebs and workers was the plan and helecopters and private jets for Sunak, Starmer and King Charles, Emma Thompson types. I see that train fares in the UK are usually about ÂŁ1 per person mile (even with my 30% off rail card they can still often hit this level). Meanwhile a full car can cost just 8p a mile and flights can be 5p mile.
So if trains are that energy efficient as the government claim why are they so absurdly uncompetitive & expensive? Plus of course the car takes a more direct route, goes directly door to door, is far more flexible, can change itinerary and times of travel (even 3am perhaps) and can carry (and store so you do not have to carry it all the time) far more luggage. Also no end connection taxis or drop offsâŠ
June 26, 2024
When Rishi went for an election six month early I though it was an idiotic decision. True things might have go even worse but little to lose it could not get much worse and something might have turned up to help. I though Rishi claimed to be good at maths and logic?
How are Sunakâs âunequivocally safeâ Covid Vaccine & big Pharma investments and interests coming on I wonder or did he sell them all? Is that Moderna MRNA plant still going to the get taxpayer funding under Starmer?
June 26, 2024
I still think it was an idiotic and irrational decision, unless his plan was to bury the Tories as deeply as possible I suppose.
June 26, 2024
LL – getting tiresome with the repetitive message on vaccines, a bit like the Libdems on daily pamphleting.
June 26, 2024
LL,
I think he has gone for election early not to be PM when s⊠hits the fan with Russia.
Odious little creep Sunak disparaged Truss economics! He was chancellor and should have ensured BoE had continuity plans during change that he helped bring about by his back stabbing of Johnson! He must realise he was chancellor when he wrecked the economy throughout covid! He must remember His school boy errors allowing ÂŁ12 billion to fraud causing Lord Agnew to resign, why did he not have the honour to do the same? Worse, we read, he did not want to investigate or bring attention to it so the public would not notice!
I blame Tory MPs for allowing such an incompetent fool who lacks the characteristics to become PM. Johnson should have appointed Redwood as chancellor or chief secretary to treasury allowing Tory party quota system to allow ethnic minority chancellor as a figure head only with Redwood calling all the shots.
June 26, 2024
YesâŠI believe it is.
URI jabs planned for lucky over 60s.
And others no doubt!
June 26, 2024
New school year in September, in sunny California.
He’s too bright not to know the outcome and make plans. Another tax exile….
June 26, 2024
@Hope “Odious little creep Sunak disparaged Truss economics!” Indeed Truss and Kwartang were just the straw that finally broke the back of the economy after the appalling mess Sunak and Andrew Bailey had left after lockdowns, the vast government waste, the vast QE, furlough, net harm vaccines…
Clever of Sunak to blame it all on Truss though – even Labour blame it all on Truss. Not Truss at all really but Sunak/Bailey gross incompetence.
June 26, 2024
Dogs BARK, Cats MEOW, Labour Puts Up TAXES! says
Deputy Foreign Secretary Andrew Mitchell.
Questioned on why the Tories had given us the highest taxes for 70+ years Mitchel said the lockdowns, covid loans, furlough and huge borrowings by Sunak as Chancellor was âVery responsible and the right thing to doâ No mate you got it and the net harm vaccines totally wrong (as did Labour and LibDims)
On the âmove to electric Carsâ Andrew Mitchel said âWe must and rightly will do soâ Why Mitchel they cost more, depreciate more, have limited range, take ages to charge, cause more tyre wear and road wear, pay less taxes and cause more CO2 not less than keeping your old car. If that bothers you – it should not.
So Andrew Mitchell has learned nothing from Lockdown or perhaps he is just lying. Another good reason to vote Reform.
June 27, 2024
The Tories keep saying they have spent 400 billion on Covid etc and a few more on supporting the rip off energy charges their mates levied, but the difference is that when they came to power the national debt was 800 billion – it is now almost 3 trillion. Sure some went to Ukraine war support but that’s still a long way from the total cock up they have made of the economy and public services and we must nor forget the ‘austerity’ programme and the 70 year high tax burden. And they think we want to let them have another go?
June 26, 2024
Think Cuba. That’s what our ICE cars will become with only a few people able to drive. The rest will walk, cycle, jog, get non existent public transport and will be…………………….happy……………. in that English congested world with building everywhere. English language rarely spoken, no Doctor, Dentist or school places. Foreign criminals attacking English people daily but never deported and we’ve just reached THE 500,000th boat person (young men). Taxes rising further to put more foreign arrivals onto welfare and build social housing for them. More non Equality, ESG, DEI legislation to shut us up!!
June 26, 2024
+1
June 27, 2024
Think Cuba on cars. That is of course as long as the oil companies think it profitable to supply petrol and diesel to this country. What happens when there is so little demand that petrol stations are a hundred miles apart or don’t exist at all? We lost lots of local petrol stations when the supermarkets started supplying, but how long will that continue? I already have to travel 5 miles to fill up whereas we used to have a village pump where we not only got petrol but service and a chat as well. Luckily for me I can still get that in a nearby town (5 miles away).
June 26, 2024
Tories following the woke agenda ….and not the views or wishes of its own membership
June 26, 2024
…and they still a haven’t changed
June 26, 2024
No mention of today’s Conservative Home article by Sir John Redwood:-
“This election has failed to grapple well with the major concerns of voters.”
First paragraph does not mention trust, broken promises and failure to heed core voters.
Conservative Home are a tough crowd. The response is similar to an English comedian appearing on stage at the Glasgow Empire.
June 26, 2024
You can observe the lack of vision you describe with the government over the giving away of our core manufacturing and commerce to overseas interests to the point of exporting the majority over the conservative decades.
With so much manufacturing lost why do we need more energy? – government and grid data shows our demand has been falling for some years, except for petrol.
Note – making it cheaper for someone on a school run to sit outside my house in their idling SUV is not an incentive.
June 26, 2024
Oh!
Idling cars and banging car music.
The absolute banes of my life.
I did ask one of the idlers whether theyâd ever heard of climate change ( I actually only care about the bl**dy noise though). They screamed in response had I ever heard of getting up to go to work in the morning?
lol đ
June 26, 2024
I was in Fowey one day when a car pulled up with incredibly loud thump thump thump emanating from it. It was ridiculously loud. People looked and pulled faces. But a young lad came out of the estate agentâs the car was outside, and thumped his fists on the roof and yelled âturnâ (thump the roof) âthatâ (thump the roof âf***ingâ (thump the roof) ânoise off!â
I expected some sort of altercation to follow – but the driver meekly turned the noise off. We all burst into spontaneous applause. The lad from the estate agentâs took a little bow and went back to his work. If only more people would shut the noise polluters up.
June 26, 2024
What a lovely anecdote! Wish more were like him.
And in lovely, lovely Fowey too.
Hope it hasnât been ruined!
June 26, 2024
So we have two diesel powered air craft carriers that are anticipated to be in service for fifty years! They will need auxiliary ships who are powered byâŠ.diesel. Currently two being built in Spain! Why not here! We need the skills, technology and ability to build core national defence assets!
The MPs put EU interests before our national interest. That is why we have so many quangos to hide implementation of everything EU.
The traitor MPs in Westminster are before our eyes. Do not vote for them.
June 26, 2024
Electricity demand has fallen mainly due to more efficient LED lighting and expensive (a net zero, rigged market) electricity pushing energy intensive industries overseas.
But overall energy demand including oil, gas, petrol, solid fuel has increased. Demand for electricity will rise hugely if we are all forced to heat using heat-pumps and to use EV cars. EV cars create more CO2 than keeping your old car does so why do they encourage this? They also have limited range, a slow to ârefillâ, expensive, have high finance and depreciation costs, wear out more tyres and more road due to heaver weight, cannot tow really⊠otherwise they are fine. As to heat-pumps several problems they are expensive to buy and maintain and also need most of their power in a few winter weeks. So the grid and supply might well need to be up to 10 times larger just for those few weeks. A hugely expensive thing to do. We also have now spare low carbon electricity to drive these heat pumps with.
Heating using heat-pumps while using electricity made from gas, coal, or bio (young wood) is an insane thing to do as much heat is wasted at the power station. It saves virtually no CO2 at all and costs far more as electricity is three times the price of gas. Anyway CO2 (plant, tree and crop food is not a serious problem). The world has had ice ages with 20 times as much atmospheric CO2. Sea ice is currently increasing at both poles too contrary to all the alarmist predictions. Plus you cannot cost effectively store the renewable energy to supply this high winter demand so it will come from gas, coal, oil, bio or perhaps nuclear.
June 26, 2024
Entirely as I have expected, the new-ish government of Niger has just revoked the licence of French nuclear fuels company,Orano(the former Areva),to mine for uranium at its Immouraren deposit (the largest in Africa and second largest in the world) – and says that Russian companies are interested in taking it over.
Niger has now kicked out the French troops that have been there since ‘independence’,denied Germany/EU the base they recently wanted to establish in the country and told the US to leave their base(the US’s largest drone base in Africa) by September – whilst inviting in Russian trainers.
The geopolitical significance of Niger is not just its resources but the fact that it sits on the crossroads of Africa’s east-west axis and one of its two north-south axes.
June 26, 2024
Allison Pearson(English 2.2, Cambridge) is surely correct in todayâs Telegraph.
(Sorry, I donât know what came over me.)
June 26, 2024
Indeed Allison is very sound on most issues despite her lack of science. Sensible podcasts too – Planet Normal with Liam Halligan.
June 26, 2024
Why do you mention her degree. Does it mean something to you? It doesnât to me. I have met many half wits with degrees. Look a the government.
June 26, 2024
The type of person who does an English or similar degrees or say a Physics/Maths/Engineering/Science degree are usually rather different types of people in general. The ones doing English probably dropped Physics/Science (and perhaps even maths) at 16.
About 2/3 of English Lit. Graduates are female. Only about 1/5 of physics/engineering/computer programming graduates are women. So quite a difference there just for a start.
June 26, 2024
Peter,
I found your post funny and understood it.
It would appear it was sadly wasted because, just like a Red Arrows display, it was way above some people’s head.
June 26, 2024
Our MP’s from both parties have mislead us and are no longer trusted. They refused to accept the Refendum result on leaving the EU. They lied to us over Covid, deliberately terrorising us by falsely informing us that we were all at risk of dieing from a disease akin to the Black Death or Ebola. They lied about an untested vaccine that neither prevents catching or transmission of Covid. They are lieing about the effect of CO2 on the Global temperature. They lied about cutting migration to sustainable levels. Why should we trust them now?
June 26, 2024
+ many. Spot on.
June 26, 2024
You only have to look over the channel to get a flavour of net zero
Voters are waking up to the ruinous stupidity of the ruling classes.
They see the rest of the world going about their daily business laughing at the self harm being done in a handful of countries.
We have to pray for a Trump victory to blow the whole scam out of the water.
June 26, 2024
+1
June 26, 2024
@Ian wragg; We have to pray for a Trump victory to blow the whole [Net Zero] scam out of the water.”
Don’t hold your breath, there are many vestige interests in the USA, some who are quietly bankrolling the Republican Party. Trump had every opportunity to blow the Net Zero scam out of the water during his last term as POTUS. Apart from pulling the US out of the Paris Climate Accord, he did little else, not even his election pledges to get the US coal and steel industries back to work.
June 26, 2024
The net zero targets must rank amongst the most stupid and most damaging ever inflicted on the UK electorate. On the one occasion a canvasser has actually knocked on my door so far, on behalf of the local Conservative candidate, he received a five minute earful from me on the reasons why it was dangerous nonsense. He said he agreed with me! Perhaps it was just to shut me up. Reform is the only party with a net zero policy I support (get rid of it and it’s related subsidies) but they have decided to focus on the unsustainable level of immigration.
CO2 is essential to photosynthesis and life on earth as we know it; it is not a pollutant. The CAGW scam is just that because the IPCC remit is to focus on man made warming and to exclude natural causes of temperature changes from its analyses and global temperature predictions! Natural causes of temperature change, dominated by the sun, the earth’s orbit, clouds and volcanic activity to name a few are what really matter but are excluded. That is why their models are useless. Of course from time to time the scientists do say, in their scientific reports, that climate is a chaotic system, that they cannot predict or model cloud cover and can only guess at the cause of the Little Ice Age (probably unrecorded volcanic action somewhere). But this remains buried deep in the reports and never makes it to the advice to policy makers. It is an astonishing exercise in mass deception.
June 26, 2024
In the 18th century Viscount Torrington had the idea of turning Salisbury Plain into a hot air balloon airport. He envisaged hot air to be the future of travel. Nowhere near as potty as NZ.
And now folk chuck paint at Stonehenge in order to promote the madness.
Where would they get their paint with no oil?
No one asks them. No one tells them to live an oil-free life.
Standing there naked ( and possibly short sighted..no specs) throwing homemade flour ( hand milled) water and natural colouring at monuments just would not cut it.
June 26, 2024
Lots of paint is water based – is it not?
June 26, 2024
Paint, even water based is laboratory/industrially made.
Synthetic pigment comes from coal tar and petro chemicals
It is ground down by machine.
Natural pigment comes from insects, plants and minerals.
Which is why I stipulated home made
If you want to do away with oil you have to relinquish everything and go back to killing whales, gathering herbs, slaughtering fattened pigs and growing flax.
Fowey c. 1720.
June 26, 2024
Still needs to be delivered.
June 26, 2024
I suppose the hot air balloons will get chopped up by all the wind turbines nowadays if not careful!
June 26, 2024
Natural causes of temperature change, dominated by the sun, the earthâs orbit, clouds and volcanic activity to name a few are what really matter but are excluded.
How does the net zero scientific lobby explain away the changes in temperature we will see this week and this season due to sun activity, orbit and cloud cover? Nothing to do with carbon in the atmosphere and yet the swing in this country’s temparature is 6 degrees each way.
June 26, 2024
Many places have temperature swings of more that 40C every day and night. Millions of things affect the climate CO2 is just one of them not even a major one.
June 26, 2024
I agree 100%. I despair that all parties, even Reform, acknowledge that there is some form of climate alarm, also known as “Global Boiling”. Does no one consult the scientists challenging this groupthink, which will impoverish us all?
June 26, 2024
We need a red team of scientists to kill the group thing lunacy and gravy train. Headed up by a William Happer, Richard Lindzen, Richard Feynman, Freeman Dyson types. We also needed this on the net harm lockdowns and the net harm vaccines and many other things – blood contamination, the economy, the post office prosecutions…
“Group think” and follow the money are the explanations for this lunacy.
June 26, 2024
Net Zero is full of holes.
Our country needs a new scoop like Reform.
Reform offers a better mesh to capture and keep more of the things we value and need to prosper.
Harmful debris like the Green and LibDem wonât pick up and will drop out.
June 26, 2024
To summarise, the lunatics have been and in future will be in charge of the asylum with respect to climate change. With the exception of Reform thay are all signed up to this quasi religion, and pursue its tenets like the inquisition of old.
I personally hope that there are sufficient numbers of Reform in the coming Commons to express the insanity of what these zealots are planning to do. Redemption will only arise with realisation that the market does not buy into it, and that industry without competative power migrates.
To your last paragraph I would say I hope so, but I am not holding my breath. Those the gods would destroy they first drive mad.
June 26, 2024
Indeed it is yet another totally new religion but also one driven by crony capitalism, blatant corruption and people clearly on the make. Also it has a vast propaganda arm with the dire BBC and many international organisations and charities to the fore here.
Look at Lords and MPs declared vested interests – just declaring them does not make these vested interests go away!
June 26, 2024
The policy comes from the UN, via the EU and WEF which is why the Westminster Uni-Party are all implementing it. The UN wishes to “level down” the west by transferring its manufacturing industry to Asia and Africa and make western taxpayers fund it through transfers and buying back the manufactured goods.
The WEF wishes to transfer ÂŁbillions from the pockets of western taxpayers to billionaires and multi-nationals.
The Uni-Party politicians, like Alok Sharma, expect to receive jobs, accolades and rewards from those who are massively enriched. And it will make no difference to the climate whatsoever, since we only produce 1% of global CO2 emissions and, anyway, CO2 is NOT responsible for climate change. It’s a trace gas which FEEDS plant growth.
In other words, like the Covid Tyranny, the Net Zero lunacy is a scam.
The Not-a-Conservative-Party hasn’t changed policy, it’s just slightly adjusted the timescale for banning cheap, efficient products and forcing us to buy expensive, inefficient ones.
If we need to talk about Net Zero, perhaps Sir John could talk about it on the BBC. Oh no, that’s not possible is it, since (in contravention of its Charter) the BBC has decided that no discussion is allowed.
June 26, 2024
@Donna; If you are going to cite the BBC Charter you really should bother read and _understand_ what it actually means.
By your rational the BBC should be giving equal time to the Socialist Labour Party, giving an open mic to anti monarchy groups etc. When Channel Four have tried doing such things in the past the political right have always scream that the channel should be shut down!
Has GBNews invited Arthur Scargill on for an interview yet, perhaps the broadcaster could also ask an SLP member to be the interviewer, with an open mic…
June 26, 2024
I haven’t heard Arthur Scargill was still doing interviews anywhere: he attended the recent 40th anniversary of the Orgreave colliery battle, but he was not quoted AFAICS. However GBNews have interviewed Roger Hallam at least twice, allowing him to have his say rather than trying to talk over the top of him Nick Robinson/Fiona Bruce style, and they have also interviewed Phoebe Plummer several times, including by Rees Mogg. GBN is far more open than the BBC to alternative viewpoints and proper debate.
June 26, 2024
Politicians have ample opportunity to put a one-sided argument, via their stage managed speeches on the hustings, in parliament, via social media – I read Farage has become top ratings on Tiktok…
An one-to-one open mic style ‘interview’ dose not give any alternative viewpoints, nor is it a proper discussion or debate, go watch an number of political interviews from the BBC 1950s archive if you doubt me! It took TW3 and people such as David Frost to rid the BBC of such nonsense.
Also when a broadcaster gives an open mic to someone it can framed whatever way the broadcaster wants; top and tail the slot with content, better still run trailers throughout the 24 hours before, designed to crate sympathy or disdain for the interviewee among the audience and broadcaster has pushed their desired editorial line. GBNews are very good at creating such a lines, as was Sky News at one time.
June 26, 2024
@Jerry – Donna’s comment seems to me fully consistent with the BBC Charter.
Recall the BBC has a Mission, “to act in the public interest, serving all audiences through the provision of impartial, high-quality and distinctive output and services which inform, educate and entertain” whilst contemporaneously meeting its Public Purposes that include “To provide impartial news and information to help people understand and engage with the world around them: the BBC should provide duly accurate and impartial news, current affairs and factual programming to build peopleâs understanding of all parts of the United Kingdom and of the wider world” and “To support learning for people of all ages: the BBC should help everyone learn about different subjects in ways they will find accessible, engaging, inspiring and challenging”
The foregoiing quotes show the BBC ought to be acknowledging and airing competing views on Net Zero.
It therefore seems to me that Donna has bothered to read and _understand_ what the Charter actually means. How about you?
June 26, 2024
Excellent response F57
Well said.
June 27, 2024
@f57; Except you have also failed to understand the BBC Charter.
There has never been a requirement for the BBC to give coverage to any political party, beyond that required by election laws, and those (election commission/Ofcom) rules require proportional coverage; such coverage is based on previous election results. The problem Reform have, despite many within the party being experienced politicos, the party its self has no past election form — this was the same issue UKIP had 20 years ago before their EP breakthrough.
Perhaps had Farege & Co. not walked away from UKIP…
June 26, 2024
Allowing a debate to take place doesn’t necessarily mean equal time. But declaring that “science is settled and therefore no debate will be permitted” is against the Charter.
Why shouldn’t the Socialist Labour Party and anti-Monarchy groups be allowed to express their opinions on the BBC?
I believe in Free Speech. That means allowing people I fundamentally disagree with the right to express their opinions.
Don’t you?
June 27, 2024
@Donna; Doesn’t the Climate Change Act 2008 effectively say the climate debate _is_ over, just as other laws say other debates are over? There is no requirement within the BBC Charter to allow (single) issue campaigning, outside of election periods.
There are all number of issues that groups or individuals think important, not just climate change, but were does one draw the (editorial) line; you want a full and frank on-going debate about AGW, others might wish for similar on-going discussion about the the Age of Consent, Hare coursing, the Right to Roam (Trespass), Squatter Rights, for example — be careful of what you wish for…
Why do I get the feeling that when you say “I believe in Free Speech” what you really mean is ‘A freedom to say what I want, assuming my argument wins the debate’. Have you forgotten, about 20 years ago, the BBC did debate Climate Change, we lost!
June 27, 2024
That is an odd post from you Jerry.
In that you ascribe to Donna the complete opposite what she actually wrote.
She said.. “that means allowing people I fundamentally disagree with, the right to express their opinions”
Answer your own question…” why do I get the feeling….etc”
Maybe I can help with my thought that you just like being contrary and “cantankerous”(as you ctually said you were recently)
June 27, 2024
@Sam; She said.. âthat means allowing people I fundamentally disagree with, the right to express their opinionsâ
Look up “Doublespeak”, saying one thing but meaning another, claiming to want “Free Speech” but actually wanting a predetermined outcome whatever the opinions offered.
June 27, 2024
That doesn’t answer my question Jerry
You simply put words into Donna’s mouth.
Which is unfair.
But it is what you do regularly to make your straw man arguments on here.
June 28, 2024
@Sam; “But it is what you do regularly to make your straw man arguments on here.”
Oh the irony… Is being contrary your hobby Sam?!
Donna clearly wants a different outcome to the Climate debate, but then claims shy wants Free Speech, except the UK has had such a debate – that we lost, hence my suggesting her comments are Doublespeak.
Whatever.
June 26, 2024
Donna,
And the Tory party were going to sort out the BBC 14 years ago and at intermittent election periods in between. No change just a huge hike in licence tax, same for councils etc. Sunak told councils to increase community charge to the maximum! Then claims to be low tax conservative!! Why do councils need huge hikesâŠ. to house, feed and provide services for millions of immigrants! Whose deliberate policy was to have mass immigration against what they promised the electorate? Tory party.
June 26, 2024
@Hope; The Conservative party did sort out the BBC, as I pointed out the last time this anti BBC bilge-water was raised. During the last 14 years the Conservative Govt chosen the current and previous BBC Director-Generals,, made Ofcom the adjudicator for complaints about the BBC, and have also appointed several Chairman and Chief Exec. of Ofcom over the last 14 years. To do much more would have made the SoS at DCMS, if not the Govt its self, appear biased against the BBC — a gift to the opposition.
Nor has there been a “huge hike” in the TVL fee, it has actually been frozen in real terms.
“Sunak told councils to increase community charge to the maximum! Then claims to be low tax conservative!!”
Indeed, but Sunak did nothing more than what Mr Howe did back in 1979, lowing some rates of Income tax only to double VAT, that budget also abolish the “Light Goods” VED class among other changes, that increased the indirect tax burden on households and the small business. The Tories a low tax party, perhaps they have been for the top one-percent.
June 27, 2024
Tripe as usual.
June 27, 2024
@Hope; Indeed you do post much offal… Whenever your comments are disputed, using hard facts, you always resort to posting abuse, usually just three words, never a rational argument as to why you disagree.
June 27, 2024
Jerry loves the BBC
You may as well give up Hope
(pun intended)
June 27, 2024
@Martin; I do not “love” the BBC, I am actually quite critical of the Corporation; what I will not accept though is brickbats and bias aimed at the BBC simply because of the way it is funded, when no one is being forced to pay the TVL fee anymore than they are forced to pay VED, TV is a choicer, as is keeping a car on the public road.
The anti TVL fee argument is oh so very last century, before the internet and all the catch-up & non-linear Streaming services that do not require a TV License.
June 27, 2024
I agree with that Hope originally said Jerry.
June 28, 2024
@MiB; As you clearly refuse to accept the facts, two easy questions; If Tim Davie is not the DG of the BBC, appointed by the May govt in 2020; If Michael Grade is not the Chairman of Ofcom, appointed by the Johnson govt in 2022 — Who are currently in those posts?!
Whatever.
June 26, 2024
Reform are going to defund the BBC, the only party with a manifesto promise to cancel the TV licence
June 27, 2024
@glen cullen; “Reform are going to defund the BBC
First Reform will need to win 360 odd seats, or at least hold the balance of power — nah, it’s not going to happen, other than in the altered reality that is the Daily Mail & GBNews dreamland.
June 26, 2024
Its as though no one in government even questions the IPCC in fear of the CCC, BBC and WEF
June 26, 2024
The first Industrial Revolution was born of necessity.
Nobody sat down and thought â Now what can I invent?â
They NEEDED the innovations to transport lovely, lovely coal from mine to works.
What is this âRevolutionâ ? A money grubbing âfishing tripâ
Which by all accounts is costing us very dear!
June 26, 2024
Cost ÂŁtrillions benefits actually negative not that it can really be done or afforded in practice.
âSo the road to net zero is on the ballot paper. Will it impact the overall result?â JR asks hopefully it will. It is worth voting Reform just to show that lack of support for this absurd rip off energy agenda. Anyway the only reason to vote Tory is if you have one of the few sound candidates (50 max) AND they are the best person to keep Labour/LibDems out. Only about 5 seats I estimate. Reform are the best bet to keep Labour out in 95%+ of seats England certainly.
June 26, 2024
With regard to NZ being an issueâŠfrom conversations I have had ( or tried to) people either refuse to discuss it or dismiss it.
â They canât do thatâ
I always ask if they remember being imprisoned in their houses.
I read somewhere that in some commie regime or other folk could be shown bodies and skeletons piled high yet still would not believe that their regime was capable of evil.
June 26, 2024
@Everhopeful; Very true, some people only ever see what they want to see, nor is this only a problem in Communist systems, and there are many levels of “evil”. Let him who is without sin, cast the first stone.
June 26, 2024
+++
June 26, 2024
‘The Lufthansa Group, the biggest airline group in Europe, is introducing a so-called Environmental Cost Surcharge of up to $77.20 (72 euros) per flight to cover part of the costs for using additional volumes of sustainable aviation fuel’ – thats the cost of net-zero and its only the start
https://www.zerohedge.com/energy/europes-top-airline-introduce-surcharge-cover-cost-clean-fuel?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTAAAR3RaVdx2dRvQl8xcyoacNCLtkA2lH6Tot4WjEO4Swfw6IsD9MyWa5J2hEw_aem_ul7wkmrp-XRm6ZzHMKDjtw
June 27, 2024
@glen cullen; Your point being what. That quoted âŹ72 is the maximum surcharge, and for many inter-European destinations there are likely to be alternative ways to travel anyway. Hasn’t France all but effectively banned domestic airline flights within France, or plan to? At least it will see the end of those OPEC induced surcharges.
Just a pity there are so few direct LondonEuropean Capital destinations offered via HS1 and the Channel Tunnel, a far more civilized way to travel…
June 27, 2024
The point is – net-zero costs money
June 26, 2024
More like The Road to Serfdom. Hayek perfectly describes the poison of Socialism which is of course the ultimate objective of Net Zero.
Understand one thing. Net Zero does not concern itself with environmental protection and those who promote this pernicious creed are deceitful, lying, malevolent shits
June 26, 2024
Ed Miliband aims to carpet tye country in turbines, pylons, solar farms and toxic burning battery parks.
June 26, 2024
Correct – Net-zero is all about control & money, and not saving the planet
June 26, 2024
You say that many voters think climate does change. To what extent does our education system teach anything about climate or weather these days. Those tasked with explaining it every half hour on TV resort to a moving but meanigless Jackson Pollock display, assuaging a clear met chart such as the one that controlled the D-Day decision. I can only speculate at Ike’s reaction to a Jackson Pollock.(JP).
JP exists because the GB voter is largely ignorant of the subject, and just like the snake oil customer can be sold almost anything. Climate Change in terms of Nett Zero is snake oil. The real Climate Change is a feature of our World that has existed for millions of years and the biggest input is that of the Sun. Volcanoes may have short term impact. Continental land mass shift has longer term impact. Understanding it and the joy of flying sailplanes with the vultures and eagles of Spain has been one of my lifes great joys. For everyone else there is the prospect of over taxed english wine as a bonus of climate change.
June 26, 2024
We need a new Giles cartoonist.
Those cartoons depicted the everyday effects of govt. policy.
2d on beer in the Budget.
No one would dare now.
The extent of our gagging is phenomenal. Forum = marketplace. All shut down now.
Social media channels and herds folk towards the prescribed opinions.
That is what it is there for!
June 26, 2024
And the madness is the swirling, sudsy lather that washes our brains quite cleanâŠ
Clean little slatesâŠall ready to be indoctrinated.
June 26, 2024
Sir John, those of us who have looked at the data know climate changes. We have always acknowledged climate change is a natural phenomenon. It is something that happened long before humans even existed and will be a phenomena long after we have gone extinct as we will in the fullness of time as all species do.
The one thing that is clear from the data is CO2 is not affecting climate. It is also clear CO2 responds to climate change or more precisely to temperature changes, it does not cause temperature change.
The biggest climate driver and influence on temperature change (which is too low to be comfortable by the way at less than 15deg C average across the world) is cloud formation.
Despite that accepted and undisputed fact, cloud formation and evolution is not even modelled in the IPCC climate models.
It is little wonder the IPCC models are hopelessly out of sync with the actual temperatures we are enjoying occasionally . The climate models all run between two and three times too hot versus reality!
Man made climate change via CO2 is a contrived hoax. Trying to change our climate via suspension of CO2 producing activities, is akin to presenting gifts to the gods and expecting them to be nice to you.
Net Zero must be cancelled if humanity is to have any future at all.
June 26, 2024
Rod Evans +1
June 26, 2024
‘Reform say they would stop the spending on net zero transition as they do not support this.’
Another good reason for voting for them, not for the Tories.
June 26, 2024
Correct – Net-zero is anti business, anti industry and anti freedom of choice
June 26, 2024
What good comments this morning.
Don’t expect ACC and nut zero or mass migration, which is all destroying this country, to be debated properly on the BBC NOT a leaders debate.
I will certainly not turn on the telly.
June 26, 2024
It would never have occurred to me to turn on the telly until you mentioned it, BOF. I think back at all the television coverage of elections I used to watch years ago and ask myself if they were just as empty and pointless then, and it’s me that’s become more sceptical. Or has election coverage in the media changed?
June 26, 2024
Every government we elect has now been hijacked by the OBR, IFS and BOE. All unelected and free to do as they will and run our government by proxy. Their rules taken straight out of the EU treaties.
The OBR, IFS and BOE and our media will decide what Net Zero looks like. Our government and Universities, which has been hijacked by these unelected institutions will play along.
All built around the deficit myth, debt myths and tax payer money myth. Which DO apply to countries who use the Euro and gave up their sovereignty. However, none of which applies to the UK. That issues our own currency.
Euro using countries do have to tax to find the funds as they can no longer ISSUE their own currency. Euro using countries do have to borrow to find the funds as they now use a foreign currency the Euro. That means their debt is also in a foreign currency the Euro. In the Eurozone bond vigilantes actually do exist as the ECB simply refuses to buy the bonds of a country decided to choose it’s own path. Use the bond vigilantes to bring them back into line.
None of that applies to the UK. The OBR, IFS and BOE have convinced the UK voters it does. Fully backed by the neoliberal, globalist press. So the OBR, IFS and BOE and our media will decide what Net Zero looks like. Our government and Universities, which has been hijacked by these unelected institutions will play along.
It is very simple. If you choose to play the tax payer money myth game. The deficit myth game and the debt myth game. While trying to win an election. Then you have already lost, as the OBR, IFS and BOE will be rolled out like the EU treaties are within the Eurozone and eat you for breakfast. They have filled the gap of judge and jury on any economic policy and replaced Brussels now we have left the EU. Act as if the UK uses the Euro and not the ÂŁ.
June 26, 2024
I agree that the new false religions of Net Zero and Man Made Climate Change are far more dangerous to our future than most of the other issues political parties argue over.
I honestly don’t think we’d be allowed to stop the madness in much the same way, we’d not be allowed to have a successful Reform Party government.
When Liz Truss attempted to implement Conservative Policies, the faceless money men withdrew their support and took measures to crash our currency and economy. You see, one of the most important life lessons you can learn is that, when you are in debt, you give others power over you.
It’s a mess and I can’t see it getting any better any time soon. I have already advised my grandchildren, get out while you can, the UK is finished.
June 26, 2024
The BOE didn’t do its job Cliff. They played politics. The truth is in the UK – HM Treasury sets the price, not The Market
https://new-wayland.com/blog/hm-treasury-sets-the-price/
As a fully sovereign nation state we are not in debt to anybody Cliff. Gilt edge saving certificates ( Gilts ) that make up the national debt are an asset of the private sector. Households and businesses. We use them to save for a pension or in our saving portfolios or buy them directly from NS & I. When they mature the government Simply credits our bank accounts with the original amount saved plus interest.
The real kicker is – Who gave you the ÂŁ’s to buy the gilts in the first place ? That my friend is written on the front of every note you have ever received in your life. It has the kings head on it. The government provides the ÂŁ’s that you then use to pay your taxes and buy the gilts.
June 26, 2024
âSo the road to net zero is on the ballot paper. Will it impact the overall result?â
The answer is yes. Certainly, many people believe it will. Is it any wonder that the Reform party has been growing in the polls? It is clear that many people believe Reform UK is the only party offering policies that are not insane.
June 26, 2024
Net zero is a Theresa May green Conservative policy, which in 2019 legislation put the UK on the path to zero emissions by 2050. Ever since, the right of the party has attacked the provisions in favour of burning more hydrocarbons
Until Sunak was anointed PM 18 months ago, there was consensus and a roadmap to achieve net zero. Since then, the Sunak administration has systematically dismantled the provisions in favour of the fossil fuel industry.
Not content with merely moving the goalposts on heat pumps, sales of EV’s etc, Sunak’s administration has actively implemented a series of anti-renewable energy policies that benefit nobody other than the fossil fuel industry. The annual CFD auction for renewables has been replaced with an annual round of oil and gas licences in the areas previously earmarked for windfarms. Solar installations on farmland have been banned in the Tory manifesto – yet thousands of acres of farmland are being permanently replaced with up-market houses that have no solar panels on their roofs
Many green Conservatives have concluded that the only way to achieve net zero, a future of cheap green energy and clean air in our cities, is to vote for Labour’s Green Plan
June 26, 2024
Let me look out of my window at the Thanet Wind Farm – not doing much as the weather conditions are perfect for the boat people. Let me check the Grid – 5% wind and 11% Solar generation. Hmm, a bit of a shortfall there. Fire up the fossil fuel back-up!
No doubt it will be better in 2030?
Perhaps you could prove to me how the reduction of the UK’s 1% of World Carbon pollution to 0% will have a major beneficial impact on Climate Change. Meanwhile China and others will achieve that for us if we do nothing.
June 26, 2024
Bright sunny day outside SG and right now (09.03) Renewables are delivering 18.4% of our energy, Gas 34% and we are importing 22%. Fact!
Labour’s ‘Green Plan’ (even assuming they can find the ÂŁ28B a year) will not make any dent in the infrastructure costs required to implement a full ‘Renewable’ (e.g. “Green”) strategy and would be much better spent in increasing our gas-fired capabilty whilst we move towards nuclear longer term.
I’d really like to see the lights coming on for a few more Christmases and not find myself huddled around the fireplace with a candle to read by in my later years
June 26, 2024
Importing 22%. 14 years. YERS 14 YEARS to make an independent energy policy with self sufficiency a National Security issue. One would think they WANT to give away our fish to the hostile EU in exchange for expensive energy!!
June 27, 2024
They do. It’s all about creating inter-dependency so that it’s impossible to survive as an independent nation. That’s why they refused to actually LEAVE the EU.
June 26, 2024
Net Zero is infeasible and attempts to achieve it are unaffordable and will completely crash the economy. The result will be social chaos with gainful employment destroyed.
The sole virtue of Labour’s plan is that reality will be evident sooner. Watch Miliband flail about trying to drum up windfarms that can’t be grid connected at unrealistic prices. Then watch the panic when it becomes clear that the only way to avoid blackouts is to get on and build new gas plants. It’s already happened in South Australia.
June 26, 2024
Thanks for your attempt to make the Conservatives look electable, SG, by mentioning some of the quite attractive things they’ve done, or started to do, or said they’d do. But I’m still not voting for them.
June 26, 2024
SG :
The annual renewables CfD auction is still proceeding in September with fixed offshore wind at ÂŁ100/MWhr twice the price of gas without carbon taxes. The CfD price for floating offshore wind, favoured by Sir Keir Starmer at his recent GB Energy speech, is ÂŁ242/MWhr. The renewable companaies in the meantime say they need more money…..
Net Zero is impossible in both economic and engineering terms. I predict that when Labour get to see reality when they gain office we will either see a massive U-turn or riots as the blackouts start. Although I will admit that Net Zero is feasible if the communists take power and implement their political philosophy that the ends justifies the means, as the USSR showed with their collectivisation program in the early 1900s. Unfortunately it didnât work, was hugely unpopular, and resulted in a huge loss of life.
June 26, 2024
Conservative party/government changed on Co2 climate change nonsense? No.
They have called an election and are saying all sorts of things as a result which they think will get them support and votes, pulling back from their demands on us . But they will abandon it all if they win because they still believe in the end of the world and world governors demands. They are not the only ones of course. Labour will be much worse.
So vote Reform everyone.
June 26, 2024
Net-zero is penitent self-flagellation for no benefit. It is the equivalent of being cuckolded by China.
It’s advocates (much like with the trans debate) offer unrealistic solutions to a non-existent problem to make themselves look informed, caring and powerful which is the opposite of their cuckolded state.
June 26, 2024
The woke elites are so clever !!!
June 26, 2024
Curiously, sterling has bounced ahead of the anticipated landslide election win for Labour – but our currency’s future probably depends on the next government convincing investors that its plans to fix a stagnant economy are credible. UK public debt-to GDP is now at a 63-year high and foreign direct investment has fallen for four out of the last five quarters up to the end of 2023
On a trade-weighted basis sterling has returned to levels not seen since the 2016 Brexit vote, as currency traders bet on a long era of currency volatility coming to an end
It looks like Shadow CHancellor Rachel Reeves has impressed both the currency markets and the global financial establishment
reply The pound is stronger because inflation is back down to 2% and U.K. real interest rates are now high. Most foreign investors have not yet heard of Rachel Reeves
June 26, 2024
John is absolutely correct.
Reeves is a clueless Labour drone who in an interview last year struggled to answer a simple question regarding QE and its effect on short term rates and government bond yields. It’s terrifying that someone so intellectually stretched could be anywhere near the levers of power.
It’s a swift descent into the abyss when these Socialist halfwits come to power. Buyers remorse should kick in very quickly
June 26, 2024
She has recently suggested that she will wait for the latest OBR Forecast before producing her first budget. Oh dear!
I suggest she learns to read the runes instead.
June 27, 2024
@Bingle; Did Reeves explicitly mention waiting on the OBR?
The reports I read simply suggested she would wait until after the parliamentary summer recess before setting a fresh Budget, which is hardly surprising given the new Parliament first meets on 7th July for signing the Oath and the election of Speaker etc, the Kings Speech is on the 17th, and summer recess starts by the end of July, there’s hardly time to debate the Kings Speech, never mind a full Budget!
June 26, 2024
And your point about FDI?
According to the ONS, UK FDI has been third globally for the last 20 years, behind the US and China (although exceeding even China in 2021 and 2022). It will not be lost on you that the UK has been well ahead of Germany and France over this period!
https://www.briefingsforbritain.co.uk/global-greenfield-foreign-investment-in-the-uk/
June 26, 2024
Is it real investment, or the selling off of British industry to overseas interests to fund our trade deficit?
June 26, 2024
Climate policy is settled as far as the media and all parties except Reform are concerned. And so the folly will continue until industry and the energy supplies are destroyed. Reform is being systematically denied airtime. The Vauxhall factories are already under threat of closure if the insane fining of manufacturers for not selling cats that few want is not cancelled
June 26, 2024
@Stred; A lovely typo there… đ
The issue with the Vauxhall plants in the UK is not just about EVs, I suspect you will find the bigger issue is over capacity of manufacturing across Europe, this is not the first time the Luton and Ellesmere Port factories have come under threat. In fact if the UK govt were to row-back even further on EV policy (against the trend in EU27+++ area) it might well seal those UK closures.
People forget that there are added costs for European car markers when supplying the UK/ROI market, a share of the market they might feel it better to simply give to their Far Eastern competitors who do not face the same extra costs.
June 26, 2024
The destruction of the European automotive industry is in full swing, with German manufacturers particularly affected. Not only is this economically danaging, but also as the vehicle fleet ceases to be replaced at adequate rates it will age Cuban style. It means that it will not modernise either once the narrow market for EVs is saturated..
June 26, 2024
Not just the automotive industry.Jim Ratcliffe of INEOS, last week :”Everyone is leaving Europe’s petrochemical industry.The market is in chaos.”
June 27, 2024
@Mitchel; Which is clearly nonsense, given how reliant many of the so called Green industries are on the petrochemical industry, a fact lost on the loons at JSO, but then they’re just Anarchists, the oil equivalent to CND but without any moral argument…
June 26, 2024
@Mark; I take it, in you opinion, any car over 10 years old must be utterly decrepit and only fit scrap…
You might be shocked at the value of the ‘classic car’ [1] industry here in the UK, it currently stands at around ÂŁ18bn. If people choose to keep their older hydrocarbon vehicles that UK ‘Cuban style’ automotive scene you talk of will be worth even more, and there will be plenty of opportunity for both OEM and after-market manufactures, even skilled apprenticeships covering a wide set of disciplines. Don’t knock it!
[1] officially 40 years old, to obtain VHI status, but many now seem to call anything over 15 years old ‘Classic’
June 27, 2024
I have just switched cars because they are no longer making the car I want. The previous one was already 15 years old, and still has life left in it thanks to the maintenance I have done and the replacement of parts that were wearing out, including suspension, timing chain etc. I intend to keep this one as long as possible, but in the end I suspect spares availability will decline.
There are plenty of cars on the roads that are already 20 years old. Many of them are likely to fail ever tighter regulation of roadworthiness. Old cars and heavily used high mileage cars end up being scrapped. If there are no replacements then we get the Cuban syndrome. EVs are not replacements.
June 27, 2024
@Mark; Sorry, you clearly have zero knowledge of the (classic) car industry, and your comment about the “Cuban syndrome” appears to be more about styling fashion than (re-)engineering.
The weakest parts in any motor car made in the last 30 years, that might prevent further use, are the Electronic Control Units (Engine, transmission, HVAC etc), but even here there will be an opening for specialist companies to repair or re-manufacture circuit boards and sensors, indeed some companies already offer re-mapping services for the after-market tuning industry.
June 28, 2024
So Jerry are you agreeing or disagreeing with Mark?
He thinks people will either keep their current car or buy second hand ICE cars rather than buying new EV cars.
In your opening paragraph you seem to say this won’t happen.
In your second paragraph you seem to say this will happen
June 28, 2024
@Sam; You clearly have not understood the discussion, or you choose to be Contrary.
I’m suggesting his opinion of what he calls the âCuban syndromeâ is wrong.
Of course people will not be left to a Hobsons choice — buy an EV or go without!
June 28, 2024
The Cuban comment refers to how people keep their vehicles operating decades after their normal life span.
Which is what is beginning to happen in the UK where motorists dislike the EV vehicles the Government is trying to force them into.
June 26, 2024
“According to the polls once again the Green Party will poll badly.”
Indeed, and only 19 points behind the Conservatives!
Meanwhile Labour with their own Net Zero agenda are on 41%, 21 points ahead of the Conservatives — so clearly Net Zero is not a concern to most voters, probably because they have been lead down the garden path by the Conservatives for the last 40 years, first with the need to kill off our own coal industry for ‘environmental reasons’ and then the pledges in the Conservatives 1997 manifesto that would:
Not that I agree with their wider misguided policy set but I can understand why some have come to believe Reform are the only option when it comes to the Climate idiocy shown by all other parties. If only the Conservatives had not lead the charge towards what became “Net Zero”, by using the environment to further their own purely political agenda in the 1980s, inviting their opponents to do likewise.
If only Liz Truss had launched her premiership on environmental reforms rather than economic…
June 26, 2024
As I write, the wonderful new world of windfarms is generating 1.98GW. That’s from an installed capacity of 30GW, so more than 90% is standing idle. Solar energy is picking up as the sun rises on a largely cloudless UK.
We are also importing 19.8% of our electricity from abroad. Whose bright idea is it to invest in overseas electricity production? Surely it would be better to do the work here, employing people paying tax, in UK companies making profits rather than damaging our balance of payments? This proportion is by no means unusual as we appear to be already suffering a chronic under generation.
June 26, 2024
Life on earth as we know it is based on Carbon.
Carbon Dioxide is essential to life on earth – without it there would be no life as we know it.
The amount of carbon dioxide in the earthâs atmosphere is 0.04% of which 3% is from man-made emissions.
Therefore man-made CO2 represents 0.0012% of the earthâs atmosphere
It is said that the UKâs contribution to that 0.0012% is 1% i.e. 0.000012% of CO2 in the earthâs atmosphere emanates from the UK
Do you really believe that eliminating all of the 0.000012% of CO2 in the earthâs atmosphere will alter the climate or help control the earthâs temperature?
Do you really believe that politicians, or anyone else for that matter, are in fact capable of controlling the earthâs temperature and climate?
Most MPs never consider the costs to people resulting from taking action to achieve this holy grail of âcarbon neutralityâ.
Who benefits from the imposition of such measures?
The whole thing is gigantic scam deigned to control and impoverish the majority for the benefit of a globalist cabal.
June 26, 2024
Sir John
As always with the signalling of a virtue our politicians remove themselves from being âhonestâ. We have the situation of cost to everyone that is not allowed to escape from those that have masterminded this great plan. What is the real cost in money and jobs?
Then we need to be told why it is 95% of the Worlds Population is not having to endure the punitive and costly Laws that this Conservative Government has placed on us. The nations we compete with get a free pass!
We need to be told why this Conservative Government is taking UK taxpayers money to subsidies foreign regimes for our energy, instead of nurturing for our safety and security our own energy production.
There are many things that could be added to the list. But you have to ask why has the Conservative Government has ensured UK business and commerce is disadvantaged on the World stage, with their policy of forced off-shoring and expensive energy. To that end they also need to be honest as what the World saving is in CO2 production by the UK being disadvantaged.
June 26, 2024
In 2019 it was asserted that the Conservativesâ 80 seat majority was a major endorsement of Brexit. In the same way the coming election will be claimed as a major victory for net zero and a defeat for Brexit as the govt to be elected is making more net zero a major policy focus and is giving nods and winks that they will do all they can to reverse Brexit.
The greens are at 5% or so arenât they? For a party with policies of such utter insanity and incoherence it is extraordinary that 5% of U.K. adults apparently support them.
June 26, 2024
Co2 is 0.045% of Earths atmosphere. The UK contributes <1% of that, in other words, a tiny amount.
Yet the last Government and most of the opposition supported the destruction of our last remaining industry, the ever increasing cost of energy and the removal of car ownership for the plebs.
All to virtue signal to the world 'look how wonderful we are'
The Green party are moronic dopes who want us to live in caves and eat grass. Not for them though. They'll continue to enjoy the benefits of modernity.
Did Emma Thompson fly in especially (again) to lecture us on her madness?
June 26, 2024
Net Zero is another one of those ‘luxury beliefs’ a phrase well coined by Matt Goodwin.
The Green Party is for and of mainly those who can afford such luxury beliefs. Ditto that for Labour, as nearly all the Labour supporting posters/boards in my area are on the grand houses and the expensive streets, as they were when Red Ed was in charge. Make of that what you will.
Scientists and others banging the climate change catastrophe drum can be made to come up with anything for the right price, be it salary wise and/or research grants.
By all means let’s have cleaner energy, let’s protect the environment but let’s be sensible and realistic while we are at it.
Having Net Zero here is literally like a raindrop in the ocean, when compared to the worldwide scenario. Unless we have some sort of protective dome over our nation, I cannot work out how our small contribution to the demise of Co2 will spare us the damage caused by the far bigger contributors.
The whole ‘Zero’ mantra reminds me very much of the Khmer Rouge obsession with taking Cambodia back to Zero!!
June 26, 2024
Iâm not convinced that man has any significant effect on the changing climate. However, just in case this is correct, letâs agree to match the carbon reductions made by India , China and the US. No point in impoverishing ourselves for a measly 1% of total emissions when the other major carbon producers are increasing theirs total output.
June 26, 2024
Sir John
I am not sure where the idea that NetZero is on the ballot paper. No one is going to amend the disastrous Laws this Conservative Government in their punishment of the UK has brought us. No one is suggesting removing the high energy levies that disadvantage UK business.
Even the EV situation is a sleight of hand, Rishiâs virtue signal on backing away from EVâs was to introduce from this year a ÂŁ15,000 fine per vehicle sold that were not EVâs on a quota basis. The seeming deferral of the 2030 deadline has been sort of brought forward on a sliding scale, too today. Meaning that if 80% of vehicles sold by 2030 are not EVâs the manufacturer has to pay the Government ÂŁ15,000 per vehicle.
These vehicles are of course all Chinese Manufactured either completely or the major components of cars will be assembled from Chinese manufactured components. To that end Rishi has handed the Chinese through their intermediary the Indian Tata Group ÂŁ400M of UK Taxpayer money to assemble such components in Somerset. No support for UK Industry again, just punitive laws and high energy costs.
Again, no honesty on Costs to UK Business, and why other Nations get on an equivalence basis a free pass. No honesty on the World savings on CO2 production. The collective dishonesty of this Parliament â they couldnât even ask the question
June 26, 2024
Dear Sir John,
Your views are lowly aligned with those of Reform. Why donât you support them?
June 26, 2024
Very aligned
June 26, 2024
Some excellent comments above, all highlighting the importance of natural factors.
(The Sun, Milankovitch cycles, plate tectonics, water vapour, ocean currents, and albedo……47th on that list CO2)
The climate has changed, is changing and will change. Puny humans have very very little impact.
It looks like an incoming Labour Govt are going to do their best to implement NZ.
I hope that the devastating consequences (job losses, blackouts, societal breakdown, death) come early, we might be able to salvage our country.
June 26, 2024
Sunak has refused to accept that his EV sales targets cannot be met, even introducing huge, unrealistic fines on car manufacturers AFTER extending the sale of pure IC cars to 2035 !
Now Starmer wants to go back to banning new IC cars from 2030, five years ahead of Europe!
Rightly, manufacturers are worried. If the politicians won’t see sense, the car companies will have to cut back the number of IC cars for sale to match the paltry sale of EVs. Not only will this make the firms unprofitable, but the dealer networks will be decimated. We could see dealerships in every town close down for lack of vehicles to sell that private customers actually want to buy.
The only winners will be the manufacturers of cheap EVs imported from China, who will make a beeline for our shores because, unlike the US and EU, we haven’t imposed massive tariffs to protect our industry. Unbelievable !
June 26, 2024
It would be a good start that all Met-Office temperature weather stations where, by law, class 1 equiped & sited, and not the current class 3,4 & 5 …..and monitor the sea levels every ten miles around our coast 24/7
if climate change was real shouldn’t we have the most acurate data available to argue net-zero policies
June 26, 2024
There is a much larger issue at stake: why have we as a nation allowed ourselves to be dictated to by hypocritical international quangos based on a set of dubious premises? Why have successive Tory Prime Ministers and Tory MPs acquiesced in beggaring the people who voted for them?
Obvious questions that Cameron, May, Johnson and Sunak should have asked themselves before it was too late.
Well, now it is too late. Now comes the reckoning.
June 26, 2024
âSo the road to net zero is on the ballot paper.â
If it wasnât for Reform the road to Net Zero wouldnât be on the ballot paper at all. All existing Parliamentary parties are fully signed up to the Net Zero by 2050 and the carbon budgets are set by the CCC and not by Parliament and if any government falls behind the courts are on hand to enforce the net zero compliance, which has already happened.
The full title is âThe Net Zero Strategy â Build Back Greenerâ. To âbuild backâ you must first destroy and this is the real purpose of the Net Zero Strategy â to destroy our economy and wealth by attempting to transition from cheap, abundant, reliable energy hydrocarbon energy to expensive, meagre, unreliable, chaotically intermittent renewables. The Net Zero supporters know that the âgreenâ technology does not work/exist (watch videos of their meetings) but they donât care because destruction is the real goal.
June 26, 2024
PS :
CAGW, for which âNet Zeroâ is the âsolutionâ simply does not exist. The IPCC WG1 Table 12 in Chapter 12 shows there to be no signal for climate change other than some slight warming. The IPCC WG1 reports just 1.2 degrees C of warming for a doubling of CO2 (P95), which will take over 100 years at the current rate of 2.5 ppm. This is because there is already sufficient atmospheric CO2 to absorb all the IR radiation available to it as defined by CO2âs IR bands and the Earthâs IR radiation Planck curve. So adding more CO2 to the atmosphere makes little difference, a phenomenon known as âsaturationâ. Even the captured Royal Society recognise saturation. The balance of the âbest guessâ of warming of 3 degrees C is claimed to be from water vapour feedback which is a nonsense as water vapour is already the biggest GHG and doesnât need CO2 to trigger a feedback and anyway either water vapour also exhibits saturation itself or else warming would show additional water vapour in the atmosphere, particularly at the high altitudes, which isnât happening.
CAGW occurring with a warming of just 1.5 degrees C (the Paris Agreement) is simply nonsense as shown by climate history. For instance in the Middle Ages, the Icelandic Norsemen colonised Greenland for several hundred years until the coming of the Little Ice Age. This will have required an average temperature increase of 5 degrees C higher than today. Also BTW, when both CO2 and temperature are low, as they have been for the past 500,000 years, CO2 is found to follow temperature â see the Antarctic Vostok ice core data.
June 26, 2024
Whilst true that “Lib Demâs … major on being against sewage discharges to rivers, offering fines on companies and regulation which we already have as their answer!” let us recall from October 2021 your own call to end sewage discharge into rivers and the Minister’s information (@ https://johnredwoodsdiary.com/2021/10/25/end-sewage-discharges-to-rivers-by-water-companies/).
The law was passed in 2010 (Flood and Water Management Act) but the crucial Schedule 3 was not implemented by government. As shown, the Minister spoke in 2021 of reviewing implementation but actual implementation was only announced in January 2023 for action this year, fourteen years after the Act!
I asked in comments back in 2021 “Can we have a Government that is on our side please? And that means not cramming rivers full of sewage, lest the minister is unsure”. The magic properties of this diary, where such asks have at times been very soon implemented, seems to have been disappointingly slow in this instance. Not really a triumph for this government.
June 26, 2024
“So the road to net zero is on the ballot paper. Will it impact the overall result?” – It might but not by much.
My view is the electorate has not invested in learning the details of what is proposed and what the impact will be, rather they just acknowledge measures are needed in future, assume the main parties propose much the same policies, and other issues exercise them more.
June 26, 2024
If the big 3 politicians started to talk about climate change their outright ignorance would quickly become apparent. They only ever talk about the need for netzero, only rarely pretending they know something about the subject by quoting information supplied from some other mislead politician or WEF spokesperson.
The simple fact is that scientists could so easily graphically demonstrate the theory behind climate change, but they are unable to provide proof. There would be too many dotted lines. So we have to rely on statements from people who should know better that the world will go up in flames in 10 years time.
Is it any wonder so many people feel deceived?
If for no other reason, the big 3 should be chucked out of parliament for invoking netzero based only on ignorance.
June 26, 2024
The road to hell, by a variety of routes, is on the ballot paper.
The voter needs to slam a few âroad closedâ signs up this election. End of the road for a lot of this madness.
June 26, 2024
“Will it impact the result ?” ; no .
June 26, 2024
Every cloud has a silver lining. No electricity means the government wonât be able to communicate with us. No TV, no radio, no Internet and no mobile phones. Just imagine life without Downing Street briefings!
The Globalists want control and that would stop when the wind doesnât blow.
June 26, 2024
Always looking for a new one, EPR.
June 26, 2024
The Green Party is superfluous because their policies are being actively pursued by the LibLabCon.
June 26, 2024
YES
June 26, 2024
It is surely past the time when politicians of all parties should start to question the scientific basis for climate alarmism, which is purported to be fossil fuel generated Carbon Dioxide, a trace gas in our atmosphere which is the basis of all life on earth through the photosynthesis of green plants. Many reputable scientists including the 2022 Nobel Prize Winner for Physics, Dr John Clauser, describe the computer projections of global warming a scam. Climate change is real and has gone on for millions of years, but is an amazingly complex system that has probably nothing to do with anthropogenic CO2. Indeed, the extra CO2 in our atmosphere is greening the earth and increasing food crops.
June 26, 2024
Letâs have a laugh for a change. Have you heard David Cameron getting pranked by Vovan & Lexus? If he canât fathom that, he has no chance to work out the âclimate change scamâ.
Here is what Maria Zakharova, who overestimates Cameron and the âchubby guy from the MODâ đ€
“I don’t believe that a second British minister doesn’t understand that he’s being set up for a conversation by pranksters. Both Cameron and, before him, the chubby guy from the British Ministry of Defence apparently just wanted to get publicity with Vovan and Lexus.
Or perhaps they wanted to float the idea that Ukraine won’t be in NATO.”
June 26, 2024
V & L are extremely clever and have some very impressive AI kit and research tools.Look at the list of people they have scammed!
A while back they even managed to join in a meeting of the US NED when it was planning its programme to interfere in the Russian elections.Hilarious!
June 26, 2024
Please forgive me for putting thought to paper this morning. What I want to see and hear from any political party is an engineering and science based approach, not to Climate Change, but to the reality tbat man is a dirty user of the Worlds recources. Proposals should be subject to value analysis and market acceptability.
Take the ICE, already at Euro 6 for emmissions, why stop there. What can be done to achieve levels 7 to 10 at an acceptable price. What exactly needs to be researched. Government’s ill conseived dictat is the dumbest way to get results.
What about all the crap we deposit in the sea. This requires enforceable international legislation. Followed by suler tanker type hoovers to collect and process it. Research to avoid micro particles in many of our daily products, so they do not pollute our seas.
Has there been serious research into filtration, ceramic or otherwise, when you use coal to produce power. We have vast resources of it from when the UK was tropical.
Then there is the supermarket driven packaging industry. Work rapidly to it being from natural sources and biodegradeable. Ask the question, does real food require packaging.
All the above could amount to a health bonus and a reduced NHS load. Any party advocating the above lines of attacking pollution would get my ear.
June 26, 2024
I would like to a lot more common sense and economic evaluation applied. It is easy to go around making ever harsher environmental standards, most which achieve next to no real benefit but add substantial cost often while failing to achieve real improvement (see e.g. ULEZ), while ignoring things that matter. We end up with flytipping because rubbish disposal is taxed so heavily. Impossible standards are ignored or circumvented while the quangocrats and politicians that impose them polish green halos. Creating traffic jams that increase pollution is now an art form.
June 26, 2024
âNet zero needs to be a bigger issueâ
Why isnât it?
Firstly because all existing Parliamentary parties are fully signed up to Net Zero by 2050. This is not democracy in action.
Secondly, because of the reach, power and influence of the BBC who, together with Ofcom, have successfully shut down debate in the UK.
The fact that senior scientists such as Happer, Wijngaarden, Lintzen, Koonin, Moore (a co-founder of Greenpeace) and Clauser (2022 Nobel Physics prize winner) etc. with different views to those of the BBC, our state broadcaster, on climate change and Net Zero are all denied any airtime, is anti-democratic and shameful and consequently making our country a disgrace in the eyes of true democracies.
June 26, 2024
PS :
The existing Parliamentary parties and the BBC cannot believe their luck that they can talk incessantly about the betting scandal rather than about major issues such as immigration (legal and illegal), Net Zero and the economy.
Perhaps the betting was even deliberate to provide a distraction to these more important issues?
June 26, 2024
Recently I wrote to the BBC citing sources of official information that prove that renewables cost much more than fossil fuels right now, and that that position will only get worse in future because of grid costs, storage and curtailment costs, and an absence of falling costs that were previously projected for wind and solar, contrary to the writing of Justin Rowlatt. Needless to say my submission was completely ignored, and the lie is repeated that renewables are cheap. Here is the chart I sent them using the data on actual CFD supported generation from the Low Carbon Contracts Company. The Day Ahead price is usually set by gas generation, and is used as the reference price in calculating CFD subsidies.
https://i0.wp.com/wattsupwiththat.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/Production-weighted-CFD-Strike-Prices-vs-IMRP-1714863079.2781.png
June 26, 2024
Nonbelievers don’t get sponsored or paid for their work and are made persona non gratis. As do right of centre people who speak out against wokery in all of our health, public services, quangos, emergency services etc. Time for the Uni Party to be gone.
June 26, 2024
The Institute of Fiscal Studies has told us to expect five years of tax rises no matter who wins power. They should now be asked for their opinion on the likely level of taxation should Net Zero be abandoned on July 5th. The voting public should have been told the economic cost of this crazy policy.
June 26, 2024
The IFS pushes the tax payer money myth. Acts as if we use the Euro and not the ÂŁ. To control any government we elect by proxy. They have taken the place of Brussels since Brexit. OBR and BOE are the sane. All unelected of course.
June 26, 2024
RL :
Parliament, never mind the voting public, have never been given an official costing for Net Zero.
The Treasury refused to give the HoC Public Accounts Committeeâs Net Zero Follow-Up Report dated 02/03/2022 any costing for Net Zero.
June 26, 2024
144 illegal aliens /criminals arrived yesterday from the safe country of France
June 26, 2024
How many deported yesterday from the backlog at huge expense? Only 14 years of Tory misrule to sort this!!
June 26, 2024
Disgraceful queue-jumpers, not waiting for Labour to be in power as Mr. Sunak suggested they were then.
June 26, 2024
Over 41,000 since Sunak declared he would stop the boats and paid France ÂŁ500 million! Good at maths my arse. 68,000 criminals from France given leave to stay here! A record! So these criminals granted leave to stay are not even in the alleged queue for Rwanda, what idiot believes Sunak?
June 26, 2024
Are you so sure that France is a safe country for migrants now that the RN is coming to power?
June 26, 2024
Environmental tax, plastic straws ban, plastic bag tax, no smoking ban, industry windfall tax, large duty on fuels, delivery tax, ULEZ, LTN, car tax, cycle-lanes, plans to ban gas boilers, plans to ban ICE vehicles, fining car manufacturers on quotas, re-wilding, â have we saved the planet yet ?
June 26, 2024
âTuesday was the UKâs hottest day of 2024 so far, with a temperature of 30.0C recorded at Chertsey in Surrey â the first time 30C has been reached since 10 September 2023.â* BBC
Chertsey is officially a Class 3 site, accurate to 1C. The weather station is slap bang in the middle of a field of solar panels since this classification,….you must read the full article
https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2024/06/26/uk-high-temperature-at-chertsey-amid-a-field-of-solar-panels/#more-74194
If the base data is wrong – then the whole policy of net-zero is weong
June 26, 2024
Any British voter who is concerned with the published but wrongly perceived dangers of CO2, should look at the facts regarding the emission levels solely produced by this country.
They will discover that we emit just 0.8% of the total global output and that we lie in 17th place in the league table of the world’s CO2 emitters. China is at Number 1, emitting around 32% of the global total which is more than the following top seven combined AND producing a new coal-fired power station per week to provide cheap electricity for their people. We have totally banned them and held up development of our own resources in favour of paying other Nations to send their Gas and Oil to us, increasing the global CO2 output during their voyages here.
Therefore, those who believe we should cut our own emissions to zero (global o/p down by 0.8%), whatever the cost, should then realise that it is a very costly and utterly pointless exercise and a massive burden upon the country, as the world’s worst, the Chinese, have no intention of matching our efforts and reducing their output. Why are we chasing rainbows?
June 26, 2024
The thrust for net zero reminds me of the great ground nut scheme in the early 50s. Google it – it will show you how catastrophically wrong government (Labour, as it happened at the time) in abject, and expensive failure, that from the very start had absolutely no chance of success because none of those involved at the time could see or even recognise the issues obviously leading to utter and expensive failure. NZ is heading down the same route and unless and until reality rears its ugly head things will just roll on
June 26, 2024
Looking at the two going head to head one of them is in hock to the lobby and it’s not the one wearing the little boy suit
June 26, 2024
âMany voters think the climate does change but are not ready or able to buy electric cars and heat pumps.â
The climate has always changed. No-one denies it changes. That is a million miles away from saying mankind is causing it, or contributing to it.
June 26, 2024
Why doesnât the Tory manifesto mention repealing the car & boiler ban, the repealing of ULEZ & LTNs, repealing the ZEV quota mandate or mentioning fracking for shale gas or reducing the imports of foreign energy âŠ.it does mention the trebling of wind-farms and building carbon capture & storage clusters
June 26, 2024
Correction – it does say in the first section (not the net-zero section) that the tories will continue with its ZEV car manufacturer quota mandate ….good-bye to our UK car manufacturers and ICE cars and hello to chinese imported EVs
June 26, 2024
It really doesn’t matter what Tories think anymore.
They will soon be the third party and irrelevant.