Sounding you out!

[Martin]

The longer I spend talking to people in the renewables organisations, the more I am becoming convinced that the government is only paying token lip-service to renewables!
A look at the utterly pathetic sums "awarded" for them sums up their attitude
"oooh lets waste some more money and set up a new inititative"......
I am sick and fed up to the back teeth with self righteous, self-aggrandising, self-congratulatory organisations - usually with three letter acronyms for a name.................all they do is start "initiatives", or "offer advice" - all broadly the same tired old stuff, and generally acting as a sponge for any monies going towards renewables - I want to see action, I'm not seeing any!
From where I'm sitting, this is not a time for "easing the throttle a tad" - but full crash slowdown - abs working overtime, brake discs glowing cherry red - if not a full handbrake turn! 8)
I think it's time to take a far more aggressive stance towards this government - rather than standing there politely waiting to see if they might be kind enough to let us have a tiny amount of money, we should be loudly demanding they do something on a meaningful scale!
(for a start, they can cancel all airport expansion plans NOW - air travel will have to be severely curtailed in the very near future!)
How many more poor bloody polar bear cubs have I got to watch falling back into the sea because they're too weak to climb back on their icefloes before someone wakes up?



or is it just me?

[ina]

It's not just you... I suppose a lot of us think like you do, but can't get their bums up to do anything about it. Goes for me, anyway.

I tend to just "do my bit", hoping that by being a good example to others I achieve a tiny bit in the right direction. Those airport expansions annoy me massively, too. So shortsighted! I've often thought I should at least write to some of those newspapers who seem to be so terribly for the environment - but at the same time advertise for cheap flights all over, even offering "readers' travel" flying all over the planet - and sometimes even reviewing "eco" holidays in far away places, to be reached only by air!

But it's good of you to let of this rant - another wake-up call to the likes of myself who tend to get a bit too complacent. Mind you, I won't join you if you get too aggressive towards this government - I stop short at beating Tony up with baseball bats!

[Clarabel]

Definitely not just you, even down to little things like recycling facilities.

I don't have exact figures but Glasgow city council say they have high figures for kerbside recycling, but thats only for people who live in a house, theres next to nothing for flat-dwellers and I wouldn't be surprised if most of the population in Glasgow lives in flats! So it looks like they are making an effort but tbh for many people nothing about the situation has changed!

[Hillbilly]

With you Martin. In my younger years I was an activist for a well know environmental organisation. Spent a lot of time battling the major 'baddies' but when I pointed out almost EXACTLY what you are saying above to my group I was told to 'f'off and concentrate on the real bad guys'. So I left. What you say is right. They are sucking money away from the real issues by hiding behind a green facade and it annoys the HELL out of me. They ARE the real bad guys. Insiduous little b..........

[Martin]

what is SO frustrating is that the public have immense power, but won't use it
I want to see stacks of diy turbine kits in B&Q at knock down prices, diy kits for solar hot water heating etc., modular plug-in pv systems - all zero rated for VAT, allied to (for once) a sensible campaign to encourage their uptake - none of it is rocket science, none of it expensive to implement, all we need to do is make damned sure bureaucrats are kept well out of it! 8)
To give you an idea of the sort of money being made by many companies in the field today, take solar hot water heating systems - in our area, the average price quoted for a simple system ranges from £6-8000 - we can do one for £2,500, using the best materials, design and workmanship- AND make a fair profit!

[Stonehead]

I think it's time to take a far more aggressive stance towards this government - rather than standing there politely waiting to see if they might be kind enough to let us have a tiny amount of money, we should be loudly demanding they do something on a meaningful scale!

Well, speaking as a member of the more aggressive set, I can say "they" simply ignore you.

While I'm careful not to turn into "Green Pen Man" I do contact MPs, MSPs, MEPs, the press, companies, green groups etc on a fairly regular basis. I'm also careful to send reasoned letters and emails, with facts and a logically set out argument.

If I'm lucky, I get an auto-reponse but most of the time the letters and emails simply vanish into the void.

I also used to practice direct action, but the croft and family now demand a higher priority while the authorities have an even bigger arsenal of laws, techniques and equipment to prevent actions taking place and if they do take place, they're rarely heard about other than via guerilla reporting on the internet.

I'm lucky to be living in rural NE Scotland, not have a mobile and use cash as much as I can, but you can now be tracked across almost all of the UK via traffic and speed cameras, mobile phones, satellite, and card transactions - in real time.

Remember the G8 at Gleneagles? I wasn't involved with the protests, but while driving north out of Dundee in my Land Rover I was stopped by police (out of all the other traffic) because my vehicle was "the sort used to transport large numbers of protestors". Actually, it was because the poolice and intelligence services know I've been involved with protests before, am a regular letter and email writer, they know who owns the car, their number plate recognition system matches it all up, and bingo - I'm stopped.

And please don't give me the standard guff about "you have nothing to fear if you're innocent". Objecting to constant monitoring isn't about allowing criminality to go unchecked; it's about the erosion of privacy and the freedom to make it known that you object to government and big business doing immoral acts in your name.

I could rant for hours about this, but I have jobs to do!

Stonehead

PS And this post, like all internet traffic, will almost certainly get scooped up by GCHQ, so hello spooks!

[Martin]

100% in agreement - what IS frightening is that you and I could well be classified as "terrorists" under the rafts of new legislation being slipped past a comatose public! We want to see change, much of what we believe doesn't fit well with unbridled capitalism - I'd like to see "independence from the US day" - that's probably enough to get me clapped in Guantanamo Bay!

[Andy Hamilton]

I use this now and again for the carry a bag campagin that I dip in and out of. The trouble is how do you find time to be an activist as well? I admire how much work you put in on the croft (stonehead) and still find time to send out letters etc to mps. - In my experience so far, send out a group email to a random cross party selection. You normally get some sort of response.

[Ranter]

With you guys al the way. I actually get letters from my MP when a 'new initiative' is launched on an issue about which I've previously contacted her. Don't think she'll be inviting me to anymore coffee mornings though...

My latest gripe is the Govt meeting the big electrical retailers & 'asking' them to stock more energy efficient items. Why are they 'asking', they should be TELLING.

And low VAT on solar panels/ wind turbines etc, they should be VAT-free.

And new-builds should have to include solar water heating, rainwater collection & re-use.

And, oh sod it, you know the rest.

[Andy Hamilton]

ah now I see why you are ranter....

The govenment want it both ways they want to keep the large companies happy and they want us to believe that they are doing something so that we are not left with a big festering pile of underwater pollution. - they can't do both.

[Boots]

It must be just you, Martin...

I haven't seen a polar bear fall off an ice floe EVER!

[Martin]

I'm a bit "visual" about things - there is an image that keeps haunting me from the Attenborough series - one scrawny polar bear unable to find the strength to climb out of the water onto the ice, thanks to us morons buggering up his home!
There are times that I am seized with despair at the stupendous stupidity of mankind - it's selfishness, it's lack of forethought - it's total lack of love and reverence for our planet - whatever your beliefs, she is our mother - we should respect her.......................

[Wombat]

Well said, mate!

[Boots]

I find propaganda very difficult to deal with, and consider it one of our biggest social probs. It propels extremist behaviour... and we all know extreme sports are wild, fun and don't make much sense, but heck, maybe they are worth the momentary buzz. Propaganda detracts from reality when things are used out of context, dramatised or misconstrued to colour peoples thinking though.... and sometimes it is difficult to determine just what is real or valid.

I agree our environmental meltdown needs to be considered, but I am not actually confident it can be reversed. The same scientists who identified it have been unable to confirm it can be.

Can't help but wonder if NASA might need to hurry up and find us another planet... We sure have made a right mess of this one...

[Martin]

as I said, I'm quite visual (hardly surprising for a photographer), and different images "speak" to different people - there were many thousands of images in the Attenborough series, but that was one that "stuck in my mind" as summing up our lunacy - some may "resonate" with you.
As to whether or not our impending calamity is reversible or not, I haven't a clue, but I'm sure as hell not going to be sitting here on my arse bleating "it's no good, we're too late", and turning up the central heating...........we know beyond ALL reasonable doubt that if we don't reverse our idiocies, and damn soon there indeed won't be a habitable planet left in a generation or two - that to me is a battle worth joining with great gusto - we may not win, we may only slow things down, but if it means that the beauty in this world that gives me so much pleasure will be here for following generations, it is worth virtually any privations! 8)
I saw a couple of programmes recently about the harsh post-war conditions in this country - rationing etc - foreign holidays? - bugger off, you had 2 ozs of butter a week!.........it was hard, it was unpleasant, it was uncomfortable, but we did survive - that was the aftermath of a just war for our freedoms, and was considered a price worth paying -we are faced with FAR worse than an evil regime overrunning us now, why the hell won't they wake up, and do something!!!!!!!!