Richer people should be made to fly less so poorer families can holiday without worsening Britain’s carbon footprint, Emma Pinchbeck, the Chief Executive of the Climate Change Committee, has said. The Telegraph has more.
Emma Pinchbeck, the new Chief Executive of the Climate Change Committee (CCC), said Net Zero meant flying should be considered a luxury, with airlines paying a price for the emissions they produce. However, she said it would be unfair to price lower income families out of air travel altogether.
Instead, the Climate Change Committee wants frequent fliers to be taxed more highly than those who fly just once a year. This would discourage richer travellers from flying as much, while not punishing the poor.
Ms Pinchbeck said: “What we have in our heads is the annual family holiday to somewhere sunny like Spain. Now I’ve got small children, so I completely understand the need for people to go away somewhere sunny every year. So we’ve tried to preserve that in our advice [to Ministers].”
She was giving evidence to the Lords Environment and Climate Change Committee following last month’s publication of the CCC’s latest carbon budget, which advises Ministers on what’s needed to reach the UK’s target of net zero emissions by 2050. …
The aim was to persuade those people taking multiple annual flights to cut down by maybe one flight, she said.
More savings might be achieved by removing CO2 directly from the air or low carbon “sustainable aviation fuels” but such technologies are in their infancy.
She said cutting emissions from aviation was one of the UK’s biggest climate challenges because there were no viable alternatives to fossil fuels. …
The impact on consumers could be huge. The CCC’s modelling suggests the cost of a ticket to Alicante in Spain would need to rise by £150, while a return New York flight would cost an extra £300. …
Richard Tice, Reform UK’s Energy Spokesman, said the CCC was turning itself into the “anti-fun police”, adding: “Ms Pinchbeck sounds like a socialist grinch, wanting to stop people flying and tell us how we must change our behaviour. When Reform win the next election, she may want to keep her CV close to hand.”
Andrew Bowie, a Conservative Party energy spokesman, said: “The Climate Change Committee’s latest carbon budget proves that Labour’s 2050 Net Zero target will require people to make huge sacrifices and cost £319 billion over the next 15 years.
“Keir Starmer and Ed Miliband are simply not being honest when they say they won’t force people to change the way they live their lives.”
Worth reading in full.
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Interesting. We have just had a “lockdown” baby and speaking to the midwifes in our regional hospital about this apparent baby decline they laughed and said they were busier than ever. Absolutely flat out apparently.
I wouldn’t want to bring children into this world.
I didn’t want to bring any children into the last one, so didn’t.
Have felt that way since the early 70’s, so made sure I didn’t.
Didn’t go down too well with my then husband or his family.
Probably just as well. Although this society is senile enough in its attitudes…
Along with the shocking revelation that more people die of respiratory viruses in winter than summer, this is “news” to our much vaunted “expert” class.
Let’s see what the fertility rate looks like after 20-40 year olds have been “vaccinated”.
Yes, that’s what I thought. They are pre-empting the fertility problem that will ensue.
‘F&ck for England or England is f&cked’, then.
For years the “experts” told us that the birth rate was “falling” when all around us, the evidence was just the opposite.
NEVER BELIEVE ANYTHING THAT YOU ARE TOLD AND ONLY HALF OF THAT WHAT YOU SEE is a maxim is what has served me perfectly well for over 70 years, never mind what the “experts” say.
The birth rate/TFR has been falling for years Philip, it’s been below replacement level since the mid 1980s. Like the total number of deaths, it’s a figure that can’t really be disputed. Our population growth – which as you rightly say we can see with our own eyes – has come entirely from immigration and longer life spans..
There’s ‘could’ again, another one is people ‘could’ get flu again
It’s alright, we’ve got enough new people coming in on dinghies so we don’t need to bother anymore with the ‘old’ way of increasing the population.
The study’s fears appear to be misplaced. “Replacement level” births implies that for every person who dies, one is born. Annual deaths in the UK averaged about 640,000 in recent years (prior to Covid-affected 2020), adjusted to the 2020 population level. So the study’s estimated 680,000 births in 2020 are well above replacement level.
That is before counting the large net immigrant influx, which would cause the total population to still grow substantially.
So, from the point of view of preventing the high population density of the UK increasing further being desirable, the reduction of births in 2020 and projected further declines are good news, and the possible 66,000 furhter drop should be regarded as the ‘best case’, not the ‘worst case’ as per the study.
I’m confused. They seem to be talking about birth rates. I understand fertility as ovulatory function and sperm count etc supporting conception. So a fertility rate seems a nonsensical concept. Perhaps I’m being pedantic.