The Environment and The Voters

According to the good people at The Guardian, voters now think that the environment is more of a priority than the economy. Actually, no, let me qualify that – the small group of voters who The Guardian bothered to ask say the environment is more important than the economy:

When asked whether tackling the environment or the economy - given global economic problems - should be the government's priority, 52% said the environment and 44% said the economy. That contradicts the widespread assumption that environmental issues are seen by voters as a luxury to be put aside in tough economic times.

So what’s happened? Has the nation gone nuts for the unproven hypothesis of global climate change? Well, no, not really – not when you drill down and look at the figures and what they may mean. Take this statement for example:

The high cost of many environmental schemes, such as the government's £100bn renewable energy plan announced last week, does not seem to have deterred voters.

Why do we think that is? Is it because voters genuinely believe in the renewable energy plan? Or is it because they feel detached from the government spending process, and don’t realise that for “government spending” you may as well write “your money”. Which is interesting – I wonder what the response to the cost would have been if the question was “what do you think about the government spending £100bn of your money on a renewable energy plan?"

And the idea that people want someone else to sort out the problem is backed up by this statement:

But the poll, reflecting findings in earlier surveys, also shows people want the government to sort out the problem rather than take on responsibility themselves.

Perfect. In other words “I’m happy if the environment gets sorted out, but I am sure as fuck not going to be doing it for myself.”

However, a majority of people seem to back green taxes:

The number of people who oppose green taxes outright is small - only 31% say this, even after they have been asked to consider the state of the economy.

Just before we go on and look at how voters don’t actually support green taxes, let’s take a look at that statement. 31% is a small number – you fucking what? Just under a third of those polled is a small number? Like bollocks is it. 35.3% voted for Labour at the last election to give them their current large majority. Is that a small amount? No, at the time is was trailed as a massive vote of support for the Nu Labour trolls.

Anyhoo, let’s look at how this apparent support is absolutely meaningless:

But 36% say the government should delay bringing them in. That suggests ministers may have a battle on their hands if they press on with plans to increase environmentally-beneficial taxes such as increased fuel duty and higher road tax on older polluting cars.

If people say they want a delay before these taxes are brought into being, then realistically what they are saying is they never want these taxes to be brought into being. Every time this poll is run, every time the government says that they want to bring in green taxes, people will say that they agree because they want to appear right on. However they will also say that they want a delay because – crucially – they don’t actually want to pay anything extra or do anything extra themselves to help the environment.

The title for The Guardian article is:

Climate more urgent than economy, say voters

Yep, they have shown throw this poll that the voters *do* say the environment is more important than the economy – just as long as the environment doesn’t require the voters to do anything and doesn’t cost them anything more.