Green Lane sets an example for us all to follow

Thanks to an email from a constituent called Ian Lewis I was pleased to discover that Britain's "greenest street" is in Yorkshire & Humber.

Green Lane, in Leeds, took part and won the Green Streets initiative which involved several streets from across the country competing to see who could save the most energy.

While the houses on the streets were given help (such as solar panels and loft and wall insulation), most of the savings came from simply turning things off at the mains, not leaving lights on, cooking more efficiently, not over-filling kettles and ditching the odd appliance. The savings made were astonishing, with Mr Lewis and his family reducing energy consumption by 45%, with Green Lane managing an average of 35%.

As Mr Lewis points out, if we were all to follow Green Lane's example across Britain, Europe and the rest of the world, we could start having an immediate and significant impact on climate change.

These are very easy changes we can all make and must start making. And if we do, we'll not only start having a real impact on the environment we’ll have more money in our pockets too.

Congratulations to all involved in Green Lane's triumph and lets hope everyone else follows in their footsteps.

Click here and here for a little more on the Green Streets initiative

Is there a link between climate change denial and Euroscepticism?

I was interested to see the speakers list at a conference in Chicago doubting the danger of man made climate change. Among them were Tory Roger Helmer, Czech President Vaclav Klaus and the Telegraph journalist Christopher Booker. Apart from being climate change deniers, these men are united by another thing: namely their visceral hatred of the European Union.

There seems to be some correlation between Euroscepticism and climate change denial. Almost the only climate change deniers in the European Parliament are the hard-right of the Tory party – Roger Helmer and Dan Hannan - the entirety of UKIP and a handful of right-wing French and Czech MEPs. These members are also the most vocal Eurosceptics.

It is fascinating that there is a link between these matters. Off the top of my head, I can suggest a couple of theories:

Perhaps it is because tackling man-made climate change has emerged as an issue that cannot be tackled effectively by nation states, but where international or EU action is most effective. It may be that their opposition is not to tackling climate change, but because they worry that it will give the EU more legitimacy.

Another theory is that they are just naturally paranoid. In the same way that they believe the EU to be a massive conspiracy to destroy nation states and replace them with an all-powerful centralised super-state, perhaps they believe that tackling climate change is another attempt by wild-eyed left-wingers and environmentalists to bring capitalism to its knees.

Or, they don't really care about either issue - they just like to be in a controversial minority, against mainstream opinion, because they know this will get them attention and media coverage.

Maybe someone should write a university thesis about it.

Come to think about it, I wonder whether flat-earthers are also Eurosceptic? If so, I expect they will soon be given lavish coverage in some of our newspapers!

2008 - a good year for the EU?

Mark Mardell, the BBC’s Europe editor, said in his blog today that “For the European project's enthusiasts 2008 has been a good year.”

He focuses on foreign affairs, with the EU brokering the Georgia ceasefire, setting up its Kosovo mission and sending a joint fleet of warships to the Somalia coast to protect shipping from pirates. He also refers to the financial crisis and the fact that “the euro has weathered the storm better than the pound” and all EU countries eventually reached “agreement on a coordinated plan to stimulate the economy”.

In my view, the biggest EU achievement this year has been the climate change package, and he could have dwelt more on that. The package does not just proclaim targets, but brings in measures to achieve them. It creates binding Europe-wide laws on emission limits for vehicles, renewable obligations, carbon trading and so on. It finances pilot projects for carbon capture and storage. It brings aviation in to the Emission Trading Scheme, which it strengthens.
This is a good example of using the EU to do more than we can achieve just by ourselves, and where Europe is leading the world ahead of the Copenhagen climate change talks.

But, as ever in the BBC, Mark feels he has to give a sop to the eurosceptics. He buys their line on the question of the Irish response to the Lisbon treaty and does not even mention the fact that almost every other member country has approved the treaty. He refers to the Irish government’s plan to seek concessions and then hold a new referendum as “the leaders of EU countries and the commission deciding that Ireland should vote again” – sorry, Mark, neither the other countries nor the Commission have any such power, only the Irish parliament can decide, if it wants, whether to hold a new referendum.

He quotes approvingly (“a stroke of brilliance”) the phrase "They don't know the meaning of the word 'No'" and refers to the EU being "an unstoppable juggernaut". Come off it, Mark! The EU can only change its rulebook (the treaties) with the unanimous consent of every single Member State. The dice are loaded in favour of the eurosceptics, who only need to obtain one single 'No'.

As it turns out, Ireland, as the single 'No', has offered to reconsider (it's still their choice), in exchange for other countries trying to meet their concerns (e.g. on the number of Commissioners, on neutrality, taxation, conscription, etc). It is actually Ireland that can, if it wants, “bully” the other countries into making concessions, not the other way around!

In fact, as ever in a grouping of 27 sovereign countries, there will be an attempt to find a compromise, to bridge the gap, to meet halfway and to try and find a solution that is acceptable to all 27 countries. This is not to ignore the result of the Irish referendum - it is to respond to the result, look at the concerns that were expressed and try to meet them. I very much hope that will be sufficient to enable a positive result in a new referendum to be held in the autumn, when it will be up to the Irish people to make their choice. Is that so unreasonable?It was, after all, the leader of the NO campaign who said the result was a mandate to the Irish government to negotiate a better deal.