Save the planet whilst eating your lunch...

David Cameron is playing Gandhi again:

“In my New Year message, I said we should remember Mahatma Gandhi’s words and “be the change we want to see in the world.”  I think it’s incredibly important for us to show that politics isn’t just about policies and elections, it’s about personal commitment and making change happen – today. This event with Climate Change Now is the first of many ways in which I want the Conservative Party to make a difference – not just through our policies but through our personal commitment and passion for change.  Today, I'm emailing our members and writing to every Conservative Association Chairman to encourage our membership to visit the Climate Change Now website and switch their electricity supplier to a renewable source."

Clicking on this website - as David Cameron and Zac Goldsmith are doing this lunchtime in a photo opportunity - seems a perfectly worthy thing to do.  Mr Cameron encourages us to do the same as we eat a sandwich in our lunchbreak.  To do so is, as the site advertises, "quick, easy and free".   Yes, free.

The real test of the green credentials of consumers will be when they do something a little more sacrificial, however.  I think Gandhi would agree with a more sacrificial understanding of what "personal commitment and passion for change" should mean.  What about cancelling the foreign holiday and that polluting plane trip, for example?  I wonder when CCHQ will launch a 'cancel your Mediterranean holiday' campaign?

Comments

[Frank Young]

Is their no end to this guy’s brilliance!!!

We're changing the world. Exactly why I came into politics and why I joined the Conservativeparty

[James Maskell]

Switching to renewable energy in 5 minutes...anyone think this sounds like something off a cheesy TV advert? Im feeling very cynical about this. I dont drive a car and instead I walk or use public transport. I re-use my carrier bags.

This is pretty preachy. I do enough for the environment as it is.

[Sir Buffy de Vere Spoofington, Bt]

Knew Gandhi. Frightfully polite when you were arrestin' 'im, unlike that blighter Nehru who kept babblin' on about his rights. Quite a decent spin bowler, too, in the annual inmates versus guards cricket match.

Shame they had to shoot 'im.

Still, David Cameron is exactly right. The world is bein' menaced by a global cloud of Chocolate Oranges, and Chocolate Orange Books, bein' peddled by WH Smith in a conspiracy to destroy the double-glazing industry. By giving up our sandwich breaks at lunchtime (well, your sandwich breaks at lunchtime, actually, my man Maude brings me some cucumber stuff at 4pm) we can all help sell more Bob Geldof records.

You know it makes sense.

[Mark Fulford]

"This is pretty preachy. I do enough for the environment as it is."

I'm not sure you should look upon it as "job done" but, even if you do, it's no reason for the rest of us not to do our bit!

[Bruce]

The electricity needed to run the "Climate Change Now" website, and the electricity Cameron needed to access the website during the photo op--did that energy come from "a renewable source"? I wonder.....

[Tory T]

I'm surprised at the sarcastic tone of your concluding remarks, Mr Editor. One of the objects of the exercise is to show people in general, and Tories in particular, that helping to safeguard our planet doesn't have to involve a return to the stone age.

One hopes that an individual, having changed his or her consciousness, may develop a better lifestyle - but it's not all or nothing.

Which is better? To be the party of the little battalions, of careful stewardship and of conscience - or to be the party of
pitiless polluters, of junk science
fantasists and of instant gratification?

[Jonathan Sheppard]

The energy debate is somewhat wider than switching electricity - which in itself has problems. I myself had to contact Energywatch when I swapped from one compnay to another - as they both decided to bill me.

What we as a party need to do is to come up with policy that ensures continuity of supply. Renewables is not the short term solution - so does this mean we import more gas, and where from? What regions of the globe will oil come from? Are we going to back a Labour Government who may decide a new Generation of Nuclear stations are required? Are we sure the coal we use is ethically sourced?

Its great the party is putting the environment and CSR on the agenda - it is Conservative territory that has been taken over by New Labour for too long. What the next 18 months will have to show is that we have long term solutions to real problems - with energy supply being paramount.

[Laughing Cavalier]

Cancel the holiday? OK if it it's Tuscany, it won't affect us Conservatives.

[Editor]

The Guardian calls it a "stunt" but they still like it...

http://politics.guardian.co.uk/conservatives/story/0,,1688468,00.html

[James Hellyer]

So he's still pursuing the Polly Toynbee vote?

[Rob]

This is gesture politics at its very best. For all those out there that love the sight of politicians washing off graffiti or cuddling a baby calf, must think this is christmas!

[James Maskell]

About the washing off graffiti, did anybody notice it was reported that as Blair was spraying off some paint, some chavs hanging round were discussing how they were going to repaint it...

[Richard Gibbs]

Of course it was a cheesy photo opportunity, that's the point, but it has got people thinking/talking about it and that has to be a good idea. It's about taking these things back from the left; can anyone imagine a Tory website talking about these things a few years ago? Exactly.
Now, where do I log on to change my energy supplier...

[Iain Murray]

Well said on the holidays point. George Monbiot, who will doubtless be heading a policy group soon, is now calling for a complete moratorium on further flights and a substantial reduction in current flights.

As for changing your supplier "for free," well, there are consequences of that choice. The renewable companies are offering to match the prices of your current supplier. That is probably unsustainable. Renewable energy is, quite simply, more expensive and the costs need to be passed along somehow. The price signal is best for this, but sadly subsidy masks that.

As a result, there will be economic consequences. A recent study by Johns Hopkins School of Public Health here in the US found that completely replacing coal-fired energy with more expensive energy like renewables would lead to reduced income, overwhelmingly amongst the poorest Americans. The reduced income would lead to about 190,000 premature deaths annually (that's in the US alone). The global warming alarmists normally claim that global warming is killing 150,000 worldwide.

More thought, Mr Cameron, fewer stunts, please.

[Richard]

Unless I am mistaken, Ghandi was a socialist and spent a lot of time in conflict with the British Government. Hardly a Conservative icon. Who next? Che Guevara?

Monbiot's proposal is a typical example of the Left showing their authoritarian side. "Thou shalt not fly because if you do we'll put you in jail".

[Rob]

Cameron's next policy announcement, "Workers of Europe rise up, you have nothing to lose but your chains!"

[Jaz]

Ghandi was a freedom fighter, who used differnet methods to obtain his goals. I think Cameron is trying to create his own image much like Ghandi's... A new way to go about conservatism?

[Sean Fear]

Noel Coward wrote rather a good obituary of Ghandi in his diary.

"Ghandi's been assasinated. What a pity. Should have happened twenty years sooner."

[Chloe Green]

There’s more to renewables than wind.
Yet what do we find on the conservative website? A picture of wind turbines! Further horror, we find details of RWE npower!
What sort of a company would destroy Romney Marsh?
What sort of industry would destroy Lewis?

With the current fury of thousands of people across this country at the futile erection of wind turbines at the expense of this countrys most treasured assets, I am at a loss for words to witness this fatal alliance.
And for what?
One 2MW, 100m high turbine will save about the same amount of CO2 per hour as two heavy duty vehicles travelling at 100kph. The cost per year of this tiny saving, i.e. the subsidy paid to the wind developers, is around £200,000.
You’d need about 2,000 2MW turbines to get the same yearly energy output of that of a modern conventional power station. AND then you’d still need the power station for firm backup, to meet demand when the wind blows too much, too little or not at all.

[James Hellyer]

"Ghandi was a freedom fighter, who used differnet methods to obtain his goals."

Ghandi also thought the Jews in occupied Europe should go willingly to their deaths. I don't see he has much moral authority to cite!

[Richard]

While I don't believe in harking back to the Empire, I don't believe in celebrating "anti-Imperialist" heroes either. Britain may not be a nation of right-wing Colonel blimps but nor is it a nation of left-wing hippies. I doubt quoting Ghandi will gain Cameron any votes. It just looks like a cringeworthy attempt to appear "fashionable".

[John Hustings]

"It just looks like a cringeworthy attempt to appear "fashionable""

I think it's trying to address the much quoted Bridget Jones Diary line about it being "perfectly obvious that Labour stands
for kindness, gays, single mothers and Nelson Mandela".

Cameron is trying to make the Tories the party of "kindness, gays, single mothers and Gandhi" instead.

[Selsdon Man]

More interference from the centre! Conservative Associations should choose the cheapest supplier and tell Goldsmith to get stuffed.

[Jaz]

"Cameron is trying to make the Tories the party of "kindness, gays, single mothers and Gandhi" instead."

Ofcourse, I think its been long enough with white-old rich straight family-oriotated men... Out with the old in with the new...

Ghandi was a bit of a socialist, but he was a revolutionary and extremely highly thought of even today. He's practically the "father" of India..which is now the largest democracy in the world.

Cameron has used a good figure, instead of using the typical "luther king" atitiudes. Infact, he used ghandi as a prime-example.

Personally I think we shouldn't diss cameron because he's using a wisemans teachings.

[Michael Tombs]

Personally, I'm all in favour of 'dissing' both Gandhi, and Cameron for providing assistance to the renewable energy lobby. The only answer to our long-term energy needs, and the most environmentally friendly, is nuclear power. Populating our countryside with ugly wind-farms (itself a form of environmental degradation) will have negligible impact, except for providing taxpayer-subsidised profits for the companies that build them.

If Cameron is serious about this issue, then he ought to be using his considerable persuasive powers to argue the case for nuclear power – not indulging in feel-good photo-opportunities.

[Jaz]

I agree that nuclear is the best way, theres an awful amount of scare mongering going on, but frankly...Its provides huge amounts of energy and little waste.

The waste that we do have isn't safe however, and maybe a solution is needed before Cameron can propose it fully.

[James Hellyer]

"We must be the change you want to see in the world"

How am I supposed to be tax cuts?

Or a smaller state?

[Jaz]

"We must be the change you want to see in the world"

How am I supposed to be tax cuts?

Or a smaller state?

Become an MP, then run for leadership... Let me know if you ever manage it ;)

[John Hustings]

"Become an MP, then run for leadership... Let me know if you ever manage it ;)"

One might have thought that it would be unnecessary to inform you if the party in question was the Conservative Party.

[Dave J]

"Ghandi was a bit of a socialist, but he was a revolutionary and extremely highly thought of even today."

Especially outside India, he's become a carboard saint that bears only a passing resemblance to the actual historical figure. He was both more complex and less likeable. Socialist, yes, and of the "self-sufficient autarky" variety later perhaps most fully put into practice in Romania under Ceaucescu, i.e., "we must be able to produce everything on our own, and who gives a fuck if that means people starve to death."

He was not the pure pacifist he's imagined to be, at least at the outset: he was active, for instance, in recruiting his fellow Indians in South Africa to fight in the First World War, and almost wound up doing so himself. The way his pacifism later developed was practically as a glorifcation of mass suicide: he wrote that European Jews should offer no resistance to Hitler and he later scorned his coutrymen who ran from the bloodbath after the partition of India rather than happily letting themselves be slaughtered.

Call this iconoclastic if you want, but at least in my mind, he was really kind of a schmuck.

"He's practically the "father" of India..which is now the largest democracy in the world."

Sort of. He was the figurehead: Nehru did the real leg work.

[Frequent Flyer]

British Airways operate a Carbon Offsets scheme where you can pay a voluntary contribution to offset the impact of your trip on climate change. I wonder how many people pay it.