If you are an 'Unthinking Green' you're likely to subscribe to the notion that sustainability brings universal benefits; if you're a little less credulous, you'll be wont to acknowledge that there might be a few \u2013 a very few perhaps \u2013 downsides. \u00a0But even then, you'll likely want to believe that these will be universally or even equitably shared. \u00a0Steve Gough was having none of it. \u00a0To anyone who would listen, and to those who didn't want to, he'd say that there would be winners and losers, and that the losers wouldn't like it very much.<\/p>\n
Many of those losers will be those in financial and situational poverty \u2013 those without the money to escape the problem or those trapped by socio-geography. \u00a0Nothing new there you might think. \u00a0In autocratic regimes, by and large the poor have to lump it. \u00a0In more democratic societies they, in theory at least, have a chance to influence matters \u2013 think of the French Gilets Jaunes<\/em>. \u00a0And some believe that we saw a glimpse of that here last week when the voters in a West London borough seemed to say \"no thanks\" to the extension of the London Ultra Low Emission Zone \u2013 ULEZ \u2013 out of the central area and into their pressured lives. \u00a0ULEZ<\/a> is the brainchild of the London Mayor and its ostensible purpose is to clean London's air, but also (perhaps) to ease the internal combustion engine to an early grave.<\/p>\n People who will fall foul of ULEZ are those, by definition, who are driving older vehicles. \u00a0These have little residual value but might be expensive to replace. \u00a0Many of these drivers do not have a lot of spare cash and a lot drive vans suggesting that it is small traders who will be badly affected. \u00a0As if they did not have worries already.<\/p>\n It's going to be instructive to see whether this becomes an election issue; to see if one of the parties recognises the discrimination here and reacts to it. \u00a0Maybe some of these completely arbitrary dates 2025 \/ 2030 \/ 2035 \/ 2045* \/ 2050 will be pushed back? \u00a0Will some policies just be abandoned or other means found to ease the transition? \u00a0Giving the market a nudge, perhaps. \u00a0Well maybe; but there is a possibility here of electoral advantage \u2013 whilst (of course) maintaining your commitment to the net zero ideal.<\/p>\n But there's a broader question here: should poorer families be held to less account than the richer ones? \u00a0For example, should they be allowed to keep on driving petrol cars and not be forced to the expense and inconvenience of going electric? \u00a0Should their houses be exempt from the swinging costs of gas boiler replacement? \u00a0Should they pay less for gas and electricity? \u00a0Should they be exempt from the energy performance certificate scandal? \u00a0Should ...<\/p>\n Sustainability advocates are always going on about helping the Earth's poor so why not start in the UK?<\/p>\n ...............................................<\/p>\n *In progressive Scotland it is, of course, net zero by 2045, not 2050.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" If you are an 'Unthinking Green' you're likely to subscribe to the notion that sustainability brings universal benefits; if you're a little less credulous, you'll be wont to acknowledge that there might be a few \u2013 a very few perhaps...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":237,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8347","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comment","category-news-and-updates"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8347","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/237"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8347"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8347\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}