Driving home climate crisis

Richard Butt
6/ 6/2008

THE last time I saw polling on the issue, just six per cent of the British population put the environment at the top of their political agenda.

So 94 per cent of us believe other stuff is more important. I bet the cost of fuel beats the environment hands down on most people’s political ‘must-sort-out’ list. That’s certainly been the feeling when I’ve done stories about it.

There’s no doubt that the more addicted you are to fossil fuels (for example, if you’ve chosen to live a long way from where you work and moan that you ‘have to drive’), the more you’re hurting.

Although the recent rises in fuel prices are mostly not to do with tax but with global economics, cutting fuel taxes would appear to be a vote winner. So why is none of the mainstream parties going for it?

Perhaps the alternatives are just too harrowing. After all, in the past 30 years, we’ve seen income tax fall a lot. The basic rate was 33 per cent when Margaret Thatcher came to power in 1979.

It’s 20 per cent now. The money lost from income tax has been found elsewhere – notably fuel and VAT.

So if fuel tax came down, how would we balance the books without cutting benefits or sacking lots of soldiers, teachers, doctors, nurses and civil servants?

Higher income tax? Are the lorry drivers and their pals really – perhaps unwittingly – campaigning for that?

Last year, a typical British family spent 27.1 per cent of their total income on tax. In France, that figure was 41.7 per cent – according to the Organisation of Economics Co-operation and Development.

The French figure is all the more remarkable when you consider that they’re not at war in the Middle East and that taxes on cigarettes, alcohol and fuel are lower than here. Maybe we should count our blessings when we hear from Inland Revenue.

So what about the arguments for a ‘polluter pays’ tax? The politicians say ‘eco’ taxes encourage us to change our lifestyles, to cut carbon dependency. It’s the same as cigarette taxes, which are a tool to get smokers to kick their filthy habit.

What the politicians should be brave enough to say is that fuel taxes are short-term pain for long-term gain. They’ve been quiet on the pain bit, though. And there’s no doubt that lots of people are now feeling that pain, although I noticed a strange thing when I was reporting on it.

At a supermarket in Hulme, diesel was 8p a litre cheaper than in a garage about two miles down Princess Road in Whalley Range. Yet people were still filling there. Bonkers! Increasing fuel prices are supposed to stop us driving so much, to get better insulation or to get companies to do things differently. As fuel goes up, it becomes more economic for supermarkets to buy more stuff locally, for example, so the whole economy should become more carbon-friendly. On the way, some people will lose their jobs. Some industries will change forever. Even our choice of where to live will be affected as getting about becomes more expensive. One day middle-class people might even get the bus.

Of course, there are lots of inconsistencies. Aeroplane fuel isn’t taxed, although it’s a huge polluter. We have no control over what happens in China or India, which seems to be an excuse for doing nothing.

In the same way that smokers kid themselves ‘it’ll never happen’ with lung cancer, fossil fuel guzzlers reckon climate change is a myth. Funny how Esso, Shell and BP haven’t been able to get credible scientists to back up such an argument. After all, if any industry has the money to fiddle the evidence and the motive to do so, it’s the oil industry.

The doubters might be right. But if they’re wrong and our generation ignores what most scientists now believe, how would history look on us if we did nothing at all?

There is one big flaw in the politicians’ argument. If we all did use fuel less, tax income would fall and then the taxman would then have to find his money elsewhere.

Richard Butt edits Channel M’s early evening news – every weeknight from 5pm