As rainforest fires rage, greed burns a hole in the world

Climate change. Two small words but combined they represent an issue that has dominated the headlines in so many ways over the last few weeks. First came the fall-out to teenage eco-campaigner Greta Thunberg’s transatlantic voyage. Careful you don’t sink, cried Brexiteer-in-chief Arron Banks in a tweet that truly showed there’s no depth to which he won’t plunge. Then came Meghan and Harry’s private jet jaunts to a number of holiday hotspots, including Elton John’s salubrious pad in Nice.

The outcry that followed, with critics citing the hypocrisy of such flights by Harry who has long proclaimed that we all have to do more to save the planet, sparked an indignant Elton into action. Defending the royals, the music legend revealed he made a large donation to charity to offset the carbon pumped into the air by their flight. Nothing to see here, then.

And, finally, the world has watched, in an almost Nero-esque fashion, as large parts of the Amazonian rainforest were burned to the ground.

The last few weeks have truly shown that efforts to protect the environment are beset by greed, self-interest, complete duplicity, and shambolic organisation.

Indeed, even the melting of the ice packs around Greenland is now seen as a commercial opportunity by superpowers who want to get their hands on the minerals that lie beneath the once-frozen wilderness.

We are now 13 years on since Al Gore’s environmental documentary An Inconvenient Truth won widespread acclaim and sparked promises of urgent action.

But, in reality, we really are no further forward.

The rain forests continue to smoulder, our seas are choked with plastic, species quietly disappear, while the lying goes on and on and on.