Janet Daley claims today that “you can be the party of the environment or you can be the party of the poor, but you can't be both”. The aims of tackling global warming and eradicating poverty, she says, are “in direct contradiction with one another”.
Her argument has two strands: Firstly, that green taxes are inherently unfair and, as they make no consideration of income, hit the poor hardest. Secondly, efforts to make bio-fuels such as ethanol are sending food prices through the roof, thus, again, hitting those at the bottom of the economic ladder.
Those two statements in themselves seem sensible enough, but does it really lead from this that you can’t tackle both poverty and global warming at the same time? On the former, Janet is of course right that the Government’s bungled VED is a regressive tax that will hit those with older, cheaper cars – invariably the poorest. But this does not mean that all green taxes or measures need be so inequitable. Janet cites water metering as another example of green taxes hitting the poor hardest, because it takes no account of income. Well, no Janet, it doesn’t. But it does take account of how much water you use, and subsequently, if you use less water, you pay less. If the richer in society want to let the tap run a littler more freely, they can pay for that privilege. Surely this is a more even-handed method of payment than simply handing over a flat rate as most do at present, regardless of use?
In addition, what about the carrot instead of the stick? Incentivising people to recycle instead of hitting them in the pocket for not doing so is again an equitable measure that would change behaviour by providing a means to save money.
Both these measures have the capacity to cut costs for individual households who choose to do so, likely to prove of most benefit to the poor, not the rich, whilst at the same time forwarding “greener” patterns of behaviour.
What of Janet’s second premise? Well, it certainly holds that the re-direction of crops, such as corn, for the production of bio-fuels instead of foodstuffs has helped in forcing prices up. It should be added, though, that commodities speculation and poor harvests have also played their role.
But does this alone mean that the pursuit of cleaner fuels inevitably drives up food prices and is therefore incompatible with helping the poor? Scientists in the US have already found ways to enhance productivity when producing ethanol from grain, and alternative clean fuels are being developed that do not impact on the world’s production of food, such as hydrogen cells or simply electrical motors (charged by non-fossil fuel power stations). So no, cleaner fuels do not automatically lead to higher food prices.
However, perhaps the fundamental flaw in Janet’s argument is what would happen if our politicians did not pursue alternative energy and fuel sources: Does she really think petrol prices and heating bills will start tumbling downwards of their own accord if we continue to rely on our diminishing fossil fuel stocks? If we want to have affordable fuels with which to run our cars and heat our homes in the future, we are going to need to find alternatives. And if we can’t, it will again be Janet’s poor that will be hit hardest.
Of course, Janet is right to an extent:
“when you are jobless and the rising cost of transport makes it inconceivable for you to travel to look for work; when the cost of decent food is climbing out of your reach, and your household energy bills are unaffordable, you are unlikely to see the contentious arguments for long-term climate change as the most urgent item on the political agenda.”
That doesn’t, however, mean that climate change and poverty are mutually exclusive, or that our politicians should give up one to focus on the other.
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