Very sad to see the impact of the heavy rain on areas of Cumbria, especially around Carlisle. It is difficult for some to argue that our weather patterns are not changing but as a lay person in this area you do wonder how much this is cyclical weather and how much is really global warming.
One of the aspects that seems to have been missed is my concern about over development for new housing. I remember when some relatively recent flooding took place in Kent there was a good deal of talk about how the development of Greenfield sites, that had previously been flood plains that alleviated the build up of water after heavy rains, had probably been as much of a contributory factor to the problems of flooding as global warming. But it is not just housing, I gather that turning these sites into animal grazing land has the same effect and I guess it could have been an issue in Cumbria.
I am sure there is something in this and we need to be very wary of Government targets to build more and more housing in the South of England, just the sort of areas that would suffer from flooding due to their relative height against sea level.
2 comments:
I suppose baked beans is a good start.
If I am honest one of the big problems in the environment debate is convincing people of the pressing need. It may be that events such as the Tsunami and the Cumbrian rains might but I am not so sure. The fact is issues need to be relevant to people to make them act and I do not think that either poiticians or the environmental movement have yet made that relevancy case. Tax is relevant, education is relevant, health is relevant but the environment is something that might fall to pieces some long time into the future. The search has to be to how we get people to connect with the issue and it might be that for all the horror of the Tsunami, if this Government acts quickly, it might focus minds on where this planet is going.
I had an interesting debate with someone on a doorstep about recycling. They were saying how they had been recycling for some years. When asked why they did it they said because it saves landfill tax and therefore helps keep council Tax down. They did not immediately see the connection between recycling and the environment and in fact felt that environmental issues were a secondary by product of recycling to reduce tax!! I think there is something there that needs to be thought through clearly.
This is a tough subject and no party has all the answers however environmentally friendly they might paint themselves.
Hi Kevin,
Happy New Year.
This is the only olace I coudl find to ask youa question...
What are your views on the new licensing laws please? and more generally on our drinking culture and town centres?
Thanks
Mark from Surbiton
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