Policies need to be greener
LOOKING at the different party policies for the upcoming local elections, I see some are hoping to build roads and cut taxes for businesses, though such tax cuts will have to be paid by someone; and many projects are using blue sky thinking painted with broad brushstrokes, such as ‘delivering high quality sustainable public transport.’
None of these policies focus enough on climate change that will impact every young person alive today.
For example, taking public transport, in England Coventry and Oxford are developing proposals to become the first parts of the UK to run an all electric bus service in order to combat climate change. That is what people will vote for, not hopes and dreams of improvements.
What is wanted are clear policies with the effects of climate change taken into consideration and equating these projects to include the cost to nature. For example, all parties continue to use the current economic model of financialisation that uses and exploits advantages in financial services that has taken over from the post war obsession of industry. The result was the 20072008 global financial crisis.
This current business/ economic model cannot continue with the challenges of climate change, we need to focus on green growth and a green econit omy that results in improved human wellbeing and social equality, while significantly reducing environmental risks and ecological scarcities.
It needs to focus and build on natural capital as a critical economic asset and public benefit. Destroying nature has a cost. The planet provides all we eat and wear, it houses us and keeps us warm.
We have to start tackling climate change at the local level with policies that focus on reducing future climate change, and it’s imperative any changes must include the cost to nature.
I suggest our political leaders go back to the drawing board and make suitable changes to their policies and give the public something concrete to vote for, like all electric busses that will reduce carbon emissions. DAVID WOOD Landore, Swansea