Regulation
27 January 2012
On the Buses, you may remember or you may be too young to remember, was a classic British TV situation comedy aired in 74 episodes between 1969 and 1973. The first spin-off film was the most successful film of 1971, beating the James Bond spyfest Diamonds are Forever. On the fortieth anniversary in 2011 fans attending an On the Buses Rides Again weekend travelled in a Routemaster bus to the London suburb of Borehamwood to take photos of a manhole cover – the very manhole apparently where, in the film, Olive Rudge got her bottom stuck. Olive was the frumpy sister of main man Stan, played by the great Reg Varney.
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Not since 1314 when the army of Edward I was sent home tae think again has Scotland faced such a menacing invasion force. A wall is under construction, with regular observation posts, to detect the first of this rapacious host and deal with them appropriately (by imposing death upon them). I was told by a source close to the First Minister that they have to be stopped at all cost from crossing the border “singing their sectarian songs, carrying their crude but deadly serrated flint blades, loaded up with cheap English booze”.
The UK government is brandishing a large pair of scissors. This time they’re not looking to cut spending but to snip away at the red tape of excessive regulation. 21,000 pieces of regulation are being considered for the scrapheap including The Climate Change Act and 226 other pieces of environmental regulation.
We live in a built environment designed primarily for car users – offices, factories, hospitals, health centres, housing. This is a result of location decisions over many decades when oil was cheap and seemingly inexhaustible, climate change was less recognised as the greatest threat we face and the projected dire consequences were so remote they could be ignored, and the reduction of carbon emissions hadn’t become a key target (and European obligation) of government policy.
The answer my friend is blowin’ in the wind. Or not – because too often the wind is not there when you need it most. And you will all have realized by now that this article is about wind turbines. You’ll have to wait a bit for love (but it’ll be worth it). A new study from the John Muir Trust finds that wind farms produce even less electricity than their supporters claim. Scotland needs reliable sustainable power supplies; and we want to cut our carbon emissions. But are we over-investing in windfarms?