There’s an impressive encampment of
climate change protestors in the Marble Arch area of London. They’ve blocked
the entrances to Oxford Street, Edgware Road and Park Lane, so are causing a
fair amount of disruption to London traffic, as they intended. It would be
churlish to point out that pollution levels are rising in surrounding streets.
That’s temporary, where as the climate disaster is likely to be very permanent.
As I walked among the dozens of
tents this morning, where people had spent the night, I was reminded of my
teenage years in the 1980s demonstrating against nuclear weapons. In the height
of the Cold War, when Reagan and Thatcher faced off against the Soviet Union,
they appeared to represent the ultimate existential threat.
I remember camping out on Clapham
Common in 1985 and using it as a base for demos and protests in a week of
action. The Leader of Lambeth Council, ‘Red’ Ted Knight, paid us a visit. At
the time, if you’d asked me why I spent more time focused on CND than, say,
Anti-Apartheid, the industrial disputes of the era or other pressing social
issues, I would have answered in the same way as today’s eco-warriors: if the
bomb goes off, the rest doesn’t matter.
Some of the current protesters get
even more specific. Climate change is more important than the hellish issue of
Brexit, they say. There is compelling logic to this and, although I voted
Remain and worry about the consequences of the stupid decision the UK made back
in 2016, it’s impossible to ignore the nagging voice that says maybe everything
has just a little out of proportion.
When you hear Lord Adonis or David
Lammy or Anna Soubry talk on the subject of the UK’s exit from the EU, they all
seem obsessed to the point of complete distraction. Meanwhile, the polar ice
caps are fast melting and by 2050, there will be more plastic in the oceans by
weight than fish.
Of course, one could make a
logical argument that climate change will only be fought effectively through
multinational collaboration of the type fostered by institutions such as the
EU. But the argument seems fairly feeble when confronted with the urgency of
the problems highlighted by demonstrators and the snail-like bureaucracy for which
Brussels is renowned.
There is, I feel, a close parallel
between Brexit and climate change though and it’s to do with human psychology
in response to looming, self-inflicted disaster. Brexit has gone to the wire. Theresa
May gambled on the deadline of a disastrous cliff-edge departure focusing the minds
of lawmakers. The deadline loomed and people started to panic. Some – such as
Yvette Cooper and Oliver Letwin – actually tried to take control of the
situation to a degree.
But notice what’s happened now.
After the extension granted by the European Council, everyone gave a huge sigh
of relief. Despite Donald Tusk’s salutary warning that we should not waste our
time, we have started to drift. Talks go on between the two major parties,
although little is known of the detail. No need to worry. We have more time
again.
I admire the climate activists,
who will no doubt be vindicated. The science behind global warming and
pollution is overwhelming and the evidence of their impact is already being
felt in countless ways. My sense of human nature, however, is that it will take
the flood waters to reach Marble Arch before anyone is prepared to change their
lifestyle of throwaway convenience.
As a teenager, I would have driven
by optimism. Today, I am not so sure.
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