Beckett: Labour -focus on the environment

"Setting out the scale of the climate change threat, she says that the economic cost ofthe 2003 European heatwave was �13.5bn. 'These events are certain to increase in frequency and intensity - the 2003 heatwave was a one in 200 year event. By 2050, it is estimated that it will be a one in two year event. For every 1C rise in global temperatures, Africa's GDP may fall by 4%. And while climate change is the most dramatic example, water shortages, deforestation and desertification also have high human and economic costs.'"



And who paid those costs? I bet it wasn't the oil companies ... but it's about time it was. It looks, though, like the insurance companies may start to make it so.



But we need to recognise the social justice angle in this too:

She adds: "Overwhelmingly, it is the poor who live in the worst environments and suffer most from environmental problems. Poorer people are twice as likely to live near polluting factories. And children from families on low incomes are five times more likely to be killed by road traffic than children from affluent areas."