Thursday 30 July 2015

How Green are the Tories?

When Cameron first became leader of the Tories he reached out for the green vote, here was a Tory who actually believed in global warming- he even travelled out to the arctic. We then had re-branding of the Tory logo with a dash of green and some sort of childs drawing of a tree thrown in.

Seems time now for a further re-brand – throw away the green bit, the tree and just have a St George’s flag and the drawbridge being drawn up with the slogan ‘I’m alright Jack’.

Since May we have had the scrapping of the ‘Green deal’ – we know it was not working but replace the scheme do not just scrap it. We have also seen the Tories state it should be easier for residents to refuse wind turbines but with a large dose of hypocrisy, Cameron informs us residents should not let their views get in the way of fracking- which will be the saviour of our nation!

This Tory dumping has hit Ipswich, making it more difficult for us to place solar panels on council roofs, we are going ahead with placing more panels on roofs but this should have been done over 2 years ago and every time we start we are always left worried that Osborne and the Tories will change the rules at any time.

As the East of England has a number of businesses involves in the off-shore wind farm industry this state of uncertainty over the industry does not help.

This ditching of any sort of green policy has now reached the Tories in Suffolk, with their latest proposal (remember the Tory slogan – the ‘Greenest’ County) to charge residents £50 for their brown bins – and they think this will help recycling!

What it will lead to is more waste in the black bins, more anti-social bonfires – remember this is on top of green waste no longer being taken in at the Foxhall waste site and big queues at Portman’s Walk after the Tories shut other waste sites including the one on the way to Shotley.

Good news for Ipswich residents is that Labour run Ipswich are not willing to charge residents £50 for their brown bin and we may also be joined in this action by Tory run Suffolk Coastal. The strange thing is that some of the Tory Cabinet who are for charging £50 for the bin may vote in their own District Council to not charge residents £50! The reason for this strange decision? It seems to me all they are interested in is moving some of the costs that the County has to pay to District Councils, making it easier for them in 2017 to come out with their one and only policy- no council tax rises for the next 5 years ( they will also fail to mention you will also have no schools, no bin collection and no care homes!)

What it does show both nationally and locally that the Tories only care about now and those who ‘have’. They have no concerns for the future of our planet- for our children or grandchildren – it is just self, self and more self.

What can you do? Write to Ben Gummer and Dan Poulter, your local Tory Councillors – ask them do they support the £50 charge on brown bins? And if they do not are they going to lobby the Tory run County not to implement this badly thought out plan!
Good news for at least one advertising agency- they will get to design a new Tory logo , no tree or any green needed this time.

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