The?? truly green answer is don’t go to Cornwall -??staying at home is??the only way to be sure you are not generating more CO2.

If you do want to go to the ??lovely south-western peninsula and are worried about CO2 output you need to conduct a proper carbon audit of your journey.

Your journey is not just the trip from station to station or airport to airport. It is the journey from your home to the place you are going to??visit?? in Cornwall.

If you live near the station in London then the train should be the greener option, especially if you can get to the station on foot or by tube. It will help if the train is carrying lots of passengers, for then the CO2 attributable to your share of the journey will be low.

If, however, you live near the airport but a long way from a main station, the equation may not be so obvious. The amount of CO2 your car or taxi pushes out to get you the station has to be added in. If the plane is modern and fuel efficient and if it is full that cuts the??part of its ??CO2 output attributable to your journey.

It also matters how far your final destination is from station and airport, and how you intend to travel that last leg of the journey. It would??often be by taxi.

One of the difficulties of these complex calculations is you cannot know in advance whether the train or the plane is going to be full, or what the CO2 ratings of the taxis and buses from stations and airports are likely to be. It is more complex than train good, car or plane bad. It all depends on where you start from, where you are going to, and the age and fuel efficiency of the different transport equipment on the way.

The greens are right that if we simply have fewer planes and trains going to places less CO2 will be pushed out, but it is by no means clear who should make the decision to cut capacity like that if you do not trust the market. The best thing the government could do is to organise Network Rail in a way which both increased capacity and cut costs, so rail fares can be brought down to more sensible levels. If we could have more rail capacity (which means more frequent services) at lower fares then we might get fuller trains, which would be a greener option.

??

I often go out on Fridays and Saturday mornings to talk to people on their doorsteps about the issues of the day.

I have been struck by the difference between the majority view of the electorate?? over climate change and the view of the government. A large majority think the planet is currently warming. Many also believe that human CO2 is contributing to that. They also believe that unless there is global action there is nothing they can do to make a real difference, as they are aware of the small contribution the Uk makes to the overall problem. They are also very critical of politicians who tell them they must pay?? more, cut back, lose some of their pleasures when those same politicians seem to spend their time flying around the world to conferences, sit in the back of ministerial limos, and preside over government departments that do precious little to rein in their own CO2 outpourings.

The government must understand this mood if it wants to lead the nation to generate less CO2. People are not going to be impressed by what Ministers say, but by what they do. The more Ministers lecture the rest of us, the more they are going to find their every journey, their domestic heating and lighting arrangements, and the state of their own departments under the microscope of the popular press. That is what the public will expect.

Today two climate change scientists have warned their profession not to over egg the argument. Clearly there is worry that the small group of critics and sceptics of the theory are beginning to influence the public, and a realisation that people will expect sober science, not?? the purple prose of propoganda from the scientific community.

The problem the scientists have is the one correctly identified by Al Gore when he remarked that the opponents of climate change are just a small " $20 million cottage industry" disagreeing with the billions of dollars committed to climate research worldwide by the many scientists and organisations who believe the human CO2 theory. This does indeed show where the balance of opinion lies, but it?? also makes some people I have talked to on the doorsteps worried in case the balance of funding is influencing the outcome of the research too much.

People are also suspicious of the way some exploit the climate change agenda for their own benefit. It makes no kind of sense to have an EU carbon permits trading scheme if they issue too many permits on the continent, enabling firms there to sell excess permits for money. It is even worse for the UK because we play the game, issue a lower level of permits, and?? end up having to buy permits from the continent. This is not helping control emissions – it is simply transferring cash from the UK to the continent.

It seems clear that the world is currently warming. We need in the UK to get on with managing the adverse consequences as a matter of urgency. When??are the government and the Environment Agency going to do something on water supply, and the risk of flooding? They tell us Rome is burning, but they go on fiddling.

And when is the government going to reform the EU carbon scheme, so it is fair between all countries, and does what it says on the tin?

The government has concluded that it will be just fine for Councils to go over to fortnightly rubbish collection. It will be an incentive apparently for people to recycle more.

There are several things wrong with this reasoning.
1. It’s counter-intuitive. It cannot be good news during a hot summer in the densely packed settlements of Labour’s urban Britain to have dustbins containing rotting food sitting around unemptied for up to 14 days. The smell will be unpleasant if nothing else.
2.Hot countries usually colllect rubbish more regularly than once a week to avoid smells, rats and other problems.
3. Many of us do not want to see the quality of our rubbish service halved – and we pay for it.
4. Many people have no children at school and are fortunate to have no need of social services. The rubbish service is one of the few things their Council provides that they need – but they all have to pay large bills to the Council. Why penalise them?
5. I cannot see how it will make people recycle more. The recycling service I receive is collected on the same day as the dustbin service, and is already only provided fortnightly. A more frequent recycling service covering more items might encourage more recycling.

My position is I wanted an amendment to protect the position of Christian agencies. I have ??pressed the Minister to amend the SI.????

Late yesterday afternoon the government chose MPs to sit on a Committee to discuss the Sexual orientation regulations.

There was nothing unusual about that, save for two things.

The first was, the Shadow Attorney General had written to the government explaining that this was a complex piece of legislation, which warranted putting?? into a Bill so that Parliament could have proper debates about it. A bill receives time for second and third reading debates, as well as a committee stage where??MPs can ??move amendments to help the government get it right. Instead we were given 90 minutes only in a committee on??something which could not be amended.

The second was, the government insisted on the Committee sitting at 8.55 am the next day, giving MPs little time to clear their diaries and do the reading necessary. Usually MPs are given several days notice of a Committee and its membership.

Yesterday also happened to be the day of the big Trident debate. It looked as it the government hoped they could slip these regulations through without much notice on the back of the ??furore surrounding the Labour splits on nuclear weapons.

This morning a good number of Conservative MPs turned up for the Committee, although most of us were not members of the Committee. Any MP can attend, and if opportunity presents can also speak, but you cannot vote unless you are an official member of the Committee.

We made a number of points of order. We urged the government to delay the?? committee, to give everyone time to read the latest draft and to talk to constituents about it.

We urged the government to have a debate on the floor of the House, given the strong interest in these regulations on both sides of the argument.

We urged the government to think again about the desirability of a Bill rather than a Statutory Instrument.

The Minister remained impassive, and the MP chairing the committee refused all our requests.

The three front bench spokespeople used up all but 3 minutes of the Committee’s time, leaving an opportunity for just one backbencher to begin a speech to set out the problems many Christians see with the regulation.

At the end of the permitted 90 minutes many MPs were frustrated that they had not been allowed to speak, and many Christian lobbyists will doubtless feel their case had not been allowed a proper airing.

??Why is this government so afraid of honest debate about these issues? They had the votes to win, but they also have a duty to engage with those who disagree, or who think the objectives can be met in a better way. Sensible governments try to win arguments, as well as trying to win votes. Bad governments think the arguments do not matter, until one day the electorate think the government needs changing.

Council Tax has earned its place as the most??unpopular tax. Huge rises under this government have catapulted it to No 1 on the hate list. The government seems set on making it even more disliked, with their ideas of snoopers coming round to see if you have improved the house, and?? higher bands for houses and flats that people have looked after well in districts where homes are valuable.

??I was pleased to see the proposal from the Conservatives that maybe people should be given a discount on their Council Tax if they improve the energy efficiency of their home. It would give them an incentive to put in the extra insulation and to??install the lower energy lightbulbs.

I would also like to see the Opposition rule out revaluation and higher bands on more valuable homes. Many people who live in them are asset rich but not income rich. A higher Council Tax would literally be taxing them out of house and home.

If the government is going to hit homes worth more than ??1million, that’s a two bedroom flat in the centre of London these days.

??

The latest figures for public sector employment show a welcome decline – 22,000 fewer in the last quarter of 2006. There needs to be steady pressure to reduce the numbers of administrative jobs, and to cut out unnecessary functions and initiiatives, to start to get a grip on the deficit and on public spending.

The overall totals are still 750,000 higher than in 1997. The pity is the failure to find jobs for well trained doctors and nurses. We need to reduce the totals in the public sector by a large number, but not by skimping?? much needed medical staff.

??The motto should be more medical consultants, fewer management consultants. The government seems to be getting it?? the wrong way round. There is a huge army of advisory and publicity staff, the??unloved unelected regional governments, people planning the ID card and so many others that we need to tackle.

I went to an interesting lunch this week, to act as one of the Commons hosts for visiting Parliamentarians from around the Commonwealth.

I invited the three developing countries represented at my table to tell me what they thought about overseas aid, how it could be improved, and whether they would like more of it.

One MP criticised it, saying it put off the day her country would make more progress for itself in creating jobs and higher incomes. The other two agreed with her that all too often the incumbent government diverted it into projects that they controlled, to make clear to voters that the home government was delivering the??money. This was not always the best use of the cash.

They also all disliked the way some countries – but not the UK – spent the money on a defined project which contractors from the donor country carried out. They felt that the recipient country needed to benefit from the jobs the extra spending could create.

Gordon Brown has started to show us his vision of Britain under new management.

In place of Blair’s grandiose??agreements which enable him to travel the world many times putting targes in place which are unlikely to be hit, we have micro manager Gordon telling us to change?? our lights bulbs and replace many of the fittings.

In the world under Gordon the homeowner will be beseiged from all sides by government. There is the threat of new higher bands for Council Tax, to charge the pensioner in the two bed flat in central London more as well as the hard?? working executive family in the good house in the shires.

There is the likelihood the valuer will call, to see if your latest home decorations and new conservatory have pushed your house into a higher band, so they can tax your design flair and effort more.

Then the green inspector will call, to see if your bulbs and boiler are compliant,and to check if you are overdoing it on the thermostat.

He may trip over the TV licence inspector, if you dare to live without a TV to watch the BBC.

This government does have such winning ways with the public!

This government loves targets. Some??it imposes on others, where it sometimes gets tough in enforcing them, and?? some it imposes on itself where it often fails to follow through as they are just for show. There’s the easily achievable target, the sensible target, and the cynical target where we will only find out years after both Blair and Brown have gone that there was????no chance of hitting it. Do you remember John Prescott’s target to stop the rise in traffic on our roads? Do you remember the targets of the first 10 year transport plan? How about Blair’s Kyoto plus target to show he was super green?

Business often uses targets to drive change. Successful businesses set targets which are stretching but achievable. They only set them when they know that there are ways of achieving them. They bring the executives and workforce on side,??persuading them ??that the target can be hit, agreeing that it should be hit, and making it worthwhile for all involved when it is hit.

We need to ask the government why they think today’s green effort meets those requirements.

If we look at what has cut the UK’s carbon emissions in the past, we can see two policies which did so.

The first is the unfortunate policy of Labour, Labour/Liberal and Conservative governments since 1970 of making things difficult for manufacturing, so factories close and business goes elsewhere in the world. This has cut our?? CO2, but not the world’s CO2 as it has simply sent the polluting processes elsewhere. This government is following policies that are leading to the location of new process industrial activity (high energy users) abroad. Despite this windfall gain on our carbon accounts, the UK’s carbon output is still rising. This policy is bad news for the UK, whilst doing nothing to reduce overall world emissions.

The second policy which made a big contribution to cutting our CO2 output was the |Conservative policy of electricity privatisation. The nationalised industry was a dirty industry which??generated a lot of CO2 as well, concentrating on inefficient coal fired stations, where we only got out about one third of the energy we put in, losing the rest as heat dissipated to the atmosphere. As soon as we privatised, the industry changed technology, going for combined cycle gas stations which were substantially more fuel efficient.

??If the government want to be serious about hitting new targets to cut the output of carbon dioxide substantially it has to identify the changes that will be needed sector by sector, persuade people they must be made, and offer incentives so it is worthwhile making them.

The best green policy I remember was the good decision to introduce lead free petrol. That was accomplished quite quickly, despite the need to adapt older vehicles, because everyone saw the need to do it, and a price incentive was given at the pump to encourage people to make the change.

??The government today should go beyond target posturing, and tell us

1. What its policy is going to be on electricity generation – is it going to encourage/regulate the industry to new higher standards of emission control?

2. How is it going to curb its own insatiable appetite for energy and carbon emission? Is there yet a detailed plan of action for every government building, to control the use of lights and heating and to install better technology to cut waste?

3. When is it going to adopt a congestion busting policy for both rail and roads? Why doesn’t it review and then tackle all the?? main pinch points on our transport networks?

4. Building on Gordon Brown’s statements about the family home, what combination of regulation and incentive is the government offering so we can all insulate our homes, install low energy lighting, and have better heating controls so our energy bills fall?

Most people are fed up with a?? government that talks the talk, but does not walk the walk itself. We don’t want more lectures, and are suspicious of more targets. If this is going to work we need a series of decisions from government. Above all we need a government that completely changes its own wasteful approach to energy use.

I remain unimpressed by most of the government buildings (national and local) that I visit. They often overheat in winter, over cool in summer, leave heating and lighting on long after all or most people have left. Many ??do not use modern condensing boilers and often lack sensitive area control systems to regulate heat and cold in a way which could be both more comfortable for users and more economical for taxpayers.

It is good news that the review of party funding may conclude there should be a ??50,000 cap on donations by any one person, company or Trade Union.

When David Cameron first pressed for that he was being brave, seeking to break out of the large donor syndrome that has caused so much trouble for our party politics in the UK. It looks as if general opinion is coming round to that proposal.

It was a proposal made from a position of strength, as there seem to be a good number of donors who would like to give large sums to the David Cameron Tory party.

The Today programme decided to take half the story from this website on the effects of global warming and misrepresent it to David Cameron in an interview. It is low grade journalism, showing the BBC are desperate to create trouble within the Conservative party but can only do so by taking a few phrases out of context.

??

No sensible person likes the idea of more or higher taxes. Socialist parties like Labour and the Lib Dems always think more and higher taxes are the answer to everything. All New Labour brought to the party was the idea that you should tell people you were keeping taxes down, whilst find as many ways as possible to put them up in ways you hoped people would not notice or mind. Any party which wants to win a majority and keep it should take on board the simple fact that a majority of people have had enough, and do not want to have to pay more tax.

??Now the Conservatives say they want to switch the balance of taxation, taxing anti green behaviour more and taxing savings and earning less.?? That could be?? sensible, especially given the overall promise that the proceeds of growth will be shared between public services and lower taxes.

I would be quite relaxed to have to pay more to fly to reflect the fuel??planes burn if I kept more of my income to be able to afford it. We already pay huge sums of tax if we drive, so the lack of fuel tax on planes and trains is something of an anomaly when you realise how much energy they consume to carry us around. Any government wanting to do such a switch will need to put the tax reductions in early so people do not see this as just another wheeze to take more money off us.

<p>I was not surprised today to be phoned by the Daily Mirror, working in conjunction with a Labour MP, to call me in for questioning about my blogsite. Free discussion and commonsense are clearly not welcomed in some quarters.</p>
<p>The immediate complaint came about global warming. Apparently suggesting that there could be any favourable consequences from global warming is akin to a crime against humanity – we need to concentrate on the gloom and doom that could descend if it was hotter and sunnier in the summer.</p>
<p>Had I not understood the dreadful consequences for people in Bangladesh or Africa, I was asked. When I pointed out I did favour preventive action to tackle water shortages and vulnerability to sea surges, and had made a speech in Parliament about that, I got the impression that did not count. It was still wrong to say anything good about global warming. For much of the developing world it would be great to have a water supply in running taps today, before the future consequences of global warming</p>
<p>So I pointed out that they run the UK at the moment, and carbon emissions are rising. They run the government, whose carbon emissions are rising. If they are so sure higher carbon can damage the people of the developing world, why are they so incapable of controlling their own emissions? Why is their beloved EU pushing up its emissions at a faster rate than the USA? And why are India and China doing so?</p>
<p>If global warming theory is correct we are in for a lot of global warming. There is no evidence that the EU, the US or BRIC are going to curb their emissions anytime soon. So shouldn’t we start planing to handle the consequences?
</p>

<p>The EU’s idiotic celebrations over their "agreement" to cut carbon emissions was greeted with insufficient scepticism by a badly briefed media.</p>
<p>There was no attempt to interview and pillory the Ministers of countries who will fail to meet their Kyoto targets, no tough questions for Becket about the UK’s failure to meet its Tony Blair imposed super Kyoto target,no questions on why they might be any better at hitting these new targets than they were at the old ones.??There was an ??extraordinary comment by one TV journalist that Mr Blair had made the wise choice to walk to the meeting. By the time we saw him he had replaced the swimming shorts with a suit somehow.</p>
<p>These people are outrageous in their brass neck. The very day the UK heralded these new targets as a great breakthrough for the planet the government had to tell us?? that in a majority of government departments, including the Environment department guarding the green flame, carbon emissions have been rising under Labour! As there is no evidence of them taking any action to curb this, I presume they intend to try to hit the new targets by telling the rest of us to shape up or else, as they carry on flying around to meetings to set ever tougher targets. It looks as if the strategy is to make flying and driving so dear for the rest of us that it will clear the roads and the skies for Ministers.</p>
<p>It is over a year since I challenged the government to show the rest of us how to live in a green way. I asked them to put in the low energy lightbulbs, turn down the heating, cancel the air conditioning, give up the plane and the car where possible, have fewer buildings to heat, turn the lights and heating off when they go home. At least that would have saved the long suffering taxpayer some money. Even that proved too much for them. The massive waste of energy around Whitehall is a disgrace on economic grounds, whatever you may think of carbon theory.</p>
<p>Instead of posturing on the EU stage, British ministers should start to do some better housekeeping at home if they want us to believe them when they claim to be frugal and green.
</p>

David Cameron does not wish to raise taxes overall. He has made clear that a lower tax economy is a more successful economy, and that he wishes to preside over a lower tax economy. He is regularly attacked by Brown/Blair in the House for saying he wishes to share the proceeds of growth between public spending and lower taxes. Labour now says Conservatives will spend billions less than them under this doctrine, and they seem to think that’s bad news!

The Conservatives are??not going??to back a scheme of national road pricing for cars, and have been very critical of the government’s crab like attempts to get extra revenue from this source. The party is looking at road charging for lorries, to make tax fairer – at the moment UK lorries pay very high diesel duties, and VED, whilst foreign lorries pay nothing, buying much of their fuel on the continent. A shift in taxation to pay as you drive for lorries could even the score for UK hauliers.

??David is always clear that technology is the best way of tackling emissions – he is not someone who wants to stop people driving or going on holiday.

It was good to see a group of scientists go over the top and ask some of the questions that should be asked about global warming theory in yesterday’s documentary. Things are not entirely as the "consensus" supposes. A recent news item has told us visits to Mars by space probes detect "global" warming there, but have not yet discovered the 4 x 4 s causing it, leading people to ask if the sun is currently hotting up affecting all of the solar system. We do need to know more about cloud formation, water vapour, sun flares and spots and volcanic activity to be sure what is causing the phase of warming that started in 1975 after 35 years of cooling.

??I have always thought we should remain sceptical about all scientific theories, for that is the way that science advances by constantly submitting theories to test. Meanwhile we are living in a period when things are warming up, so we should manage any unhelpful consequences of that and welcome the good effects it will have. We do need to increase the water supply in the drier south of the UK and make sure we have enough water stored in case we have longer drier periods, and we do need to improve sea defences in case there is going to be a combination of small rises in sea level and higher storm and tidal surges. We will benefit from the better weather for tourism, agriculture and outdoor sports. Fewer people will die of the cold and from snow and ice in the winter.

??It also makes sense to work away at cutting the amount of energy we burn, and at reducing the amount of waste gas that our systems push out. Oil and gas is getting scarcer and dearer, and comes mainly from troubled parts of the world. We should reduce our dependence on it. The UK should try to lead in green technology, showing how we can maintain a good lifestyle, whilst burning less hydrocarbon, and burning what we need more efficiently.

So let’s be greener and cleaner, but let’s stop pretending mankind is in control of the natural world, or understands everything that lies behind changes in average temperatures.

Today the EU will solemnly sign us all up to yet more targets for reducing CO2 emissions with no sense of irony or the humbug involved.

There will be no public apology for the failure of several EU states to hit the last set of targets under Kyoto.

There will be no apology for all the jet flights undertaken to get to and from the meeting, or for the high fuel burn ministerial limos sitting on the tarmac with the engines on to keep the drivers warm.

There will be no apology from Mr Barroso, Commission President, for using a high carbon emitting vehicle himself.

There will be no explanation that the increases in carbon emissions from the US are now at a slower rate than emissions from the EU – instead the implication will be theat the US is the epicentre of the problem.

Doubtless all the heating and lighting systems of the EU high command will continue at full blast after the new targets have been set, just as they were before they were set.

Last night??TV news did go round Whitehall and show the disgraceful waste of our money, with heating and lighting systems at full blast long after civil servants had gone home. A temporarily chastened Mr Miliband was forced to admit the government "has to do better" at controlling its own emissions!

The last time I went to an anti global warming event at the Foreign Office they flew in a German Minister to tell??us we needed to travel less. When I asked them to turn the heating off because it was a hot day they could not do so, and opened the windows instead so taxpayers could have the pleasure of paying to heat??the rest of ??London. When I asked them to turn the lights off because the sunlight was very bright they did eventually manage to do that. When they announced that the afternoon session would be at the DTI, all of??seven minutes walk away, I thought they were caricaturing themselves because they had laid on vehicles to take people there!

These people talk green b ut don’t act green. people are going to get mightily fed up with being told they have to pay mroe taxes, travel less and make sacrificxes, when they see the EU politcal elite behaving in such a contradictory manner.

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