|
Climate change is the defining issue of our time. An atmospheric phenomenon driven by human activity, there is great opportunity for the ordinary citizen to make a difference. Raising awareness and encouraging citizen involvement at a domestic level is fundamental to tackling climate change. The Government must do more to achieve greater co-ordination of publicly funded messages and strategies to deal with the problem. Sir David Attenborough drew the analogy with the wartime mindset that wasting food was wrong. The threat of climate change may have grave consequences for future generations and we all need to adopt a similar mentality that wasting energy is simply wrong.
During our inquiry we heard from many interested and enthusiastic individuals and community groups who were keen to make their contribution, but were finding that Government did little to help. The Government must do more to encourage and help them. For those who remain uninterested, the Government must do as much as possible to ensure that, in their purchasing decisions, only the most climate-friendly options are available.
The Government and its organisations must follow other countries to encourage individuals and communities to use their own ingenuity and money to reduce emissions. Feed-in tariffs for household microgeneration of renewable energy should be available. The existing combination of grants and Renewable Obligation Certificates is far too unreliable and unwieldy for domestic and community microgeneration, and risks losing citizen engagement. Both Germany and Denmark have already met their renewables targets three years early as a result of operating a feed-in tariff system. The UK Government's aim to enshrine its CO2 reduction targets in legislation notwithstanding, "UK plc" may well be missing out on valuable business opportunities that come with being a market leader in microgeneration technologies.
Environmental taxation has an important role to play in driving up demand for environmentally beneficial goods and services, but much more needs to be done to improve the credibility of 'green taxes'. As a start, the Government must avoid putting revenue-raising taxes in a 'green wrapper', simply to increase palatability.
Defra must do more to ensure other parts of Government pay attention to the climate change aspects of all that they do. There is an important role for public buildings and public investment in leading the way by example, but very little evidence of this taking place. The Government's—and Parliament's—poor record regarding its own estate fails to set a good example. The public sector continues to miss a valuable opportunity in that respect to demonstrate the financial and environmental savings that can be made.
| 
