“Sorry, but I can’t let this pass by un-remarked upon. This article by Allister Heath is so deeply, to use the word former Director of Public Policy at Facebook, Sarah Wynn-Williams, used in the title of her book about her time at that company, careless.
Imagine Allister, if Britain, a country whose ecosystems, flora and fauna, crops, housing, infrastructure, everything basically, has been designed for a non-Mediterranean climate were to somehow ’embrace’ a Mediterranean climate (have you actually talked to any farmers this summer? Tried living in a poorly insulated apartment?), then what do you think life will be like for people in the actual Mediterranean? Sub-Saharan Africa? And what do you imagine life in Sub-Saharan Africa would be like? The surface of Venus? The lack of compassion in your piece is breathtaking.
We will undoubtedly have to “learn to handle hotter weather” (adaptation), but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t also do everything possible to stop this getting worse (mitigation). For you, in a paper that has spent decades belittling, undermining, straight up lying about climate science and climate scientists, to now just casually in a throwaway line say “we’ve lost the war against climate change” is a pretty momentous ‘blink-and-you’ve-missed-it’ moment.
If we have actually lost the war against climate change, might you also in your piece recognise that Extinction Rebellion, Just Stop Oil and the entire climate movement, so maligned and demonised by your newspaper, were actually entirely right? Might you explicitly name and go after the oil and gas companies who are responsible and knowingly criminally negligent in bringing that about, as it isn’t after all, something that has just naturally occurred?
And might you also admit publicly now that your paper’s entire editorial position for years has been wildly, and I might suggest, knowingly wrong? If you do actually think “we’ve lost the war against climate change” (a view I don’t share – yet) then should you not be running an apology to all of your readers for perhaps the greatest betrayal of any news outlet in history?
Might I also suggest a practical action, that you organise a screening of the National Emergency Briefing in the offices of The Telegraph for all your team, and have an honest discussion with everyone afterwards? That you close the door to oil and gas lobbyists and their think tanks?
And that, in the spirit of the NEB, you now tell the truth to your readers about this new editorial position of yours, the impacts of which go way beyond “embracing a Mediterranean lifestyle”, which rather than your mental image of linen shirts and chilled rosé, actually means profound climate instability, fires, floods and appalling heatwaves. It’s time to stop being careless and flippant and being honest with your readers.”