Navigating The Climate Change Moral Maze

Councillor Jo Biddolph blogs about environmental concerns and local issues

With climate change dominating the news this week, the council’s Cleaner Greener Hounslow workshop on Wednesday was unexpectedly well-timed. Guided by independent consultancy Eunomia, our role was to consider ways in which the council and we could reduce our environmental impact.

As a committed (for which read obsessive) recycler. I’ve long said that our aim should be to reduce, not increase, the amount we recycle by producing less waste overall. I’m currently in despair about the volume of single use plastics in my red box; it has shot up thanks to my lodgers’ ready meal suppers.

We discuss ways of reaching our transient residents who, it often seems, appear less aware of the need to recycle. Is language a barrier to creating a cultural shift? Why do some people ditch their recycling habits when under pressure such as before going away? What can be done to make
recycling routine for all?

Having attended a celebration of Indian independence in a large field in Ealing a couple of weekends ago, at which all but one food stall served home-made samosas, curries and gulab jamun in plastic tubs or on polystyrene plates, my view is that every event held on or in Hounslow property – including our open spaces – should be required to be plastic-free.

Imagine my disappointment when, at a meeting with visitors at Hounslow House today (Friday), two days after the climate change workshop, a trolley was wheeled in offering coffee, tea and half a dozen plastic bottles of water. Two Labour councillors reached for plastic bottles. I reached for the jug of tap water in front of us on the table. It takes time to change minds but time is running out on climate change.

An image flashed into my mind of my too long ago visit to India where not to drink plastic-bottled water means dysentery or, at best, Delhi belly. The efforts we residents make here in Hounslow – with a population of around 260,000 – can seem pointless in a global context but that’s no reason to give up.

A nip to the ladies loo – where the dilemma was to dry hands on throw-away paper towels or under a heated hand dryer – left me wanting to know which option has the greater environmental impact, taking into account every step each goes through: sourcing, manufacturing, packaging, freighting, installing, using, recycling/throwing away. Drinking water was served in glass jugs and glasses – but what is the environmental cost of glass that needs to be washed, rinsed, dried (in a dishwasher or by hand using a couple of cloths) and that can’t be recycled if broken? We need a price list, or a green-amber-red identifier, to guide us through the climate change moral maze.

Yes, of course we considered the impact of cars (at our table, councillors and council officers had a surprising number of car drivers who said they would find it very hard to be car-free – I suggested they provide their colleagues in traffic/transport with a reality check). Which to do – a few hours’ journey by car to a remote part of Wales to spend a weekend with elderly parents, improving their quality of life, or taking longer to travel less impactfully and turning round to come home very soon after arriving leaving very little time for social interaction?

Climate change is a deadly serious subject. Should it ever be balanced against a socially beneficial action such as, for example, air-freighting fruit, the international sales of which mean jobs and incomes for the least well-off in the developing world or should it always be considered in isolation? We left scratching our heads.

No such puzzlement for Labour councillors asked for their views on the Extinction Rebellion activism a few miles away. All those interviewed would join in wholeheartedly and applauded the activists’ actions, however extreme, to highlight the climate emergency. As a former lobbyist, I support and defend the right to protest to give people and causes a voice. I don’t support disruption to individuals, businesses and services. We have a long history of peaceful protest in London, by marching to and demonstrating at Trafalgar Square. There are effective ways of highlighting even the most worrying of issues without disruption.

The workshop had started with a climate emergency temperature gauge. We were asked to raise an arm high if we were hopeful of the future, hover it somewhere in the middle if we weren’t sure, or hold it low down if fearful. At the end of the day temperature gauge, the half a dozen arms held high had disappeared; our mood was significantly more fearful about our ability to act fast enough.

Making the most of and from our allotments

Climate change was inevitably raised at Thursday’s seminar and workshop on allotments. There are seven allotment sites in Chiswick’s three wards and 21 in the 13 wards in the rest of the borough. Lucky us! Growing fruit, veg and flowers to cut, provides obvious benefits to health and wellbeing; supports education; encourages sustainability and biodiversity; and provides airmile-free food. It’s not so good when the maintenance service is so slow that a water tap at one site was left on full for six months while waiting for repair. Theft, flytipping, people living in sheds, providing water, the need for loos, managing the waiting list and allocating allotments that have been empty for years … the problems and requests came in as thick as a pea-souper. Everyone agreed more staff are needed, as is a much greater level of awareness of what having an allotment entails – it requires more effort than turning up for a couple of hours over a weekend, with a book and a G&T, to sit in the sunshine.

No sitting still with a general election in the offing

There’s no time for slouching when Seena Shah, our newly selected Parliamentary candidate, comes to town. We are off at a fast pace introducing her to residents. There is no door knocking without picking up work and Cllr Ranjit Gill and I went home with several issues to follow up including the unswept state of our roads, dangerous out-of-true paving stones and partially-filled potholes. Attempted burglaries and policing concerns gave us the chance to say that Ranjit has succeeded in persuading our borough police team to reinstate the third public meeting we were promised but which was withdrawn. We should next week have a date to announce.

Subjects raised with me this week

A house of multiple occupation (HMO) where over 100 people party for nights on end keeping
neighbours awake, strewing waste, urine and worse in the garden and over a neighbour’s fence. The house has its own Facebook page and YouTube video encouraging visitors to its debauched way of life. Neighbours complained for over 15 years but gave up relatively recently, resolving to move. The council has no trace of those complaints which means starting from scratch, keeping incident/noise records of anti-social behaviour before action can be taken. A festering fly tip between two shops and unfortunately on private land so it’s not for Hounslow Highways to remove.

Other issues raised : Begging on Chiswick High Road; An illegal car repairing business affecting residents’ quiet enjoyment of their homes; Business rates and rents and competition from street stalls.

DATES FOR DIARIES

• Cabinet Question Time: Wednesday, 16th October at 7.00pm at St Michael’s Elmwood Road.
Seats are first-come, first-entry. Questions will be taken from the floor as well as from those
submitted in advance (the deadline for that has passed).

• Borough council: Tuesday, 29th October at 7.30pm at Hounslow House
• Chiswick Area Forum: postponed and a new date to be confirmed
• The future of policing in Chiswick: date to be announced soon
Surgeries
• Chiswick: Every Saturday from 9.30am to 10.30am at Chiswick Library, upstairs in the private
room.
• Gunnersbury: First Saturday of the month from 10am to 11am at The Triangle Club, The
Ridgeway, W3 8LN, usually a group discussion but privacy can be arranged.

October 11, 2019