Reparations won’t solve climate issue

COP27 has been a useful talking shop but has been short on causal analysis on how the industrialisation of the West has actually been responsible for the climate change problem since the Industrial Revolution (1760-1830).

This is particularly the case in the 21st century, when the main industrialising countries – the

United States, Russia, China, Germany, Australia and India – appear to have no real intention of reducing their use of coal, as John Deards indicated in his letter.

The demands at the conference for financial reparations from the West to the countries most affected would only serve to impoverish the lifestyles of ourselves, even if it was at all practically feasible, as well as bankrupting our economies.

The real danger is that if reparations were attempted, the backlash in the West would lead to the rise of a new form of fascism on a scale similar to what happened in Germany after World War One. The German economy all but collapsed with six million unemployed and hyperinflation, the rise of Hitler and the Nazi Party and World War Two. We have been warned.

The main problems affecting climate change are largely caused by the geographical conditions of over-population in poorer countries, particularly in Africa, and extreme flooding in Pakistan and Bangladesh. No amount of money by way of reparations will solve these problems, which are largely of a technical nature.

Jeremy Comerford Chippenham, Wiltshire