Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Evidence is mounting that Brexit, and possible “contagion” of the British exit from the EU, the empowerment of nationalist movements throughout Europe demanding their own exit referenda, is the worst nightmare come true for green groups which had been counting on the bureaucratic authoritarianism of the European Union to bind democratically elected politicians to strong green policies.
Brexit: Environmentalists fear ‘bonfire’ of regulations designed to fight climate change and protect wildlife
Remain campaigners have argued that EU legislation has helped towards tackling water and air pollution, protect endangered species and imposed tough safeguards on the use of genetically modified crops and potentially dangerous chemicals.
Regulations set in place to help fight climate change and protect Britain’s wildlife may be destroyed following the Brexit result, top environmentalists have warned.
Reacting to the vote to leave the European Union, charity groups and climate change campaigners said the result could have a “devastating” effect on the UK environment, since more than 70 per cent of environmental safeguarding comes from European legislation.
Greenpeace UK executive director John Sauven said: “Many of the laws that make our drinking and bathing water safe, our air cleaner, our fishing industry more sustainable and our climate safer now hang by a thread… There is a very real fear that Cameron’s successor will come from the school that supports a bonfire of anti-pollution protections.”
Plastic should be considered toxic once it gets into the environment, MPs told
In an post-referendum statement, Friends of the Earth said the group could “no longer rely on the EU to protect our nature and habitats”, adding that clean beaches, air quality and bees were among the factors put at risk by potential loss of EU legislation.
My opinion is green groups are paying the price for putting all their eggs in one basket, for decades of ignoring the wishes of their membership, for relying on their influence with establishment politicians and agencies to fulfil their agenda. Now those establishment politicians and agencies are preoccupied with fighting for their own political survival, My guess is they are simply not taking calls from representatives of the increasingly irrelevant establishment green groups.
“Many of the laws that make our drinking and bathing water safe ( men are growing breasts)
, our air cleaner, ( people can not afford to heat their homes)
our fishing industry more sustainable (the EU has effectively shut down the fishing industry)
and our climate safer (only a moron would think a 1/2 degree through adjustments)
now hang by a thread…good
Anthony, when I logged onto WUWT (I logged on by clicking on the WUWT button from Jo Nova’s blog), a message appeared on my screen indicating that the WUWT Blog’s certificates of “pureness” were out of date and implied that by logging on my computer might suffer. I was given the option of “continuing” which I selected. Then at least twice during my time on WUWT the same message appeared. Just thought you’d like to know.
The two most likely reasons are that you have been hacked via a Man In The Middle attack, or are running an old browser that doesn’t support the newest SSL TSL standards (and the old ones are being shut down as a security flaw was found in them).
Run a good Antivirus and malware detection kit, update to a browser from the last 2 years, and try again (there are other causes too, but more rare).
It’s somewhat bigger than that Eric. Someone’s “Opening Statement” …
While the UK gets its ducks in a row, maybe the US will finally start getting its indigenous hoodlums under control.
OMG, & Woo Hoo!
Well crafted over and unders take years to perfect. Take a potty mouthed musical interlude in political correctness …
Wow! That was excellent! The tide has turned and how! Beaut stuff. 😀
The EU was okay when it was just a European free trade zone with a common currency but of course the goal of the leftists/statists/progressives that ran it was never so modest. They wanted a one Europe government unelected and run by them. That’s what’s happened over the decades. The Brits finally got smart and decided to take their sovereignty back. Hopefully the rest of the EU nations will do the same.
Now we’re hearing the same sort of doom and gloom put out by the alarmists over Brexit as we do about climate change. Most if not all of it will prove to be untrue.
Chuck,
Fortunately we weren’t daft enough to take on their currency ! I was one of those who voted 41 years ago
to stay in the EU. What it was then and the monster it has grown to be are vastly different – the opportunity to get out was provided by one brave man – Nigel Farage. Without him there would have been no Brexit.
Cameron saw 4 million voters move over to his UKIP and saw the writing on the wall and allowed a referendum – Cameron thought he could contain the ‘sheeple’ by frightening the crap out of them through the BBC and Project Fear aided by that gobby knob of a “president” you have.
Ironically, that’s what did it. We weren’t going to take it anymore-especially from a guy trying to act the part of a president in the style of Sidney Poitier !
He’s a waste of space but it seems to have taken a while for you to realise this.
I was once the Youth of the country and was taken in by the ‘cum-by-ya ness’ of it all, as are the current kids; but this time we were very close to becoming totally stateless serfs in an EU governed by the unelected fourth reich.
The sooner this is realised by the rest of Europe the better. There is evil at the heart of this monster and it must be slain.
Oh no – the UK’s enviro standards might slip all the way to those of Switzerland and Norway if not for the EUSSR!
There’s only 1 deg they care about: The one that forces members to build and subsidise wind. I’m sure if the Czechs commercialised thorium tomorrow they would find a reg prohibiting it.
Quite so – the non-problem must not be solved at any cost.
Er… The Swiss and Norwegians had to sign up to all EU directives (including freedom of movement) as part of their trade deal.
In effect, thy have to run on EU environmental law, without having any vote, MEPs etc
It’s kind of doubtful at the moment whether the pro-Brexit politicians over here are going to keep *any* of their promises. Even the one to actually leave the EU. (They are dragging their feet over Article 50, mostly because they see it as the kiss of death and nobody wants to be the individual to actually invoke it!)
A bonfire of regulations of any kind seems unlikely any time soon.
Gus,
Sure, bonfires are a long way off. There are many other issues that need resolving first before the Climate Change Act and Green slimy issues get to the top of the pile.
The problem with Article 50 is that it’s a virtual pamphlet. A piece of incomplete law that was never expected to be invoked. It is so open to interpretation that no one knows quite how it works until we dive in.
Ducks need to be lined up before anyone goes near the Invoke button !
It might help if we had a credible government and someone with a brain heading it up (certainly the opposition is falling apart – 11 resignations/sackings so far today !)
Nature (and the electorate) abhor a vacuum.
Who is panicking? The europists.
It doesn’t matter whether the article 50 is invoked as long as the effect of leaving are there.
UK should begin dismissal of UE regulation and inform UE leaders that tax money is going to be sequestered if they make any more threats against UK.
UE is weak, UK is strong.
I’m stacking up on popcorn. And matches 🙂
People under the age of 40 years have been raised with the indoctrination of the NWO in all of their schooling. They literally need time to be deprogrammed there is so much rubbish sloshing around inside their scull its’ not their fault.
The British Parliament has been enacting environmental regulations since 1848. British influence for environmental action was key to the setting up of a number of European and Global environmental commitees (UNEP, Berne Convention, RAMSAR, CITES, MAR). The environment only became an EU competence in 1987. And arguably has been less effective since than the National action and international cooperation that preceded it…
There really isn’t a case for suggesting that the UK is incapable of undertaking responsible effective necessary financial regulation outside the structures of the EU. It is Horse Puckey*** and splinters of the first water….
*** I should get bonus points for “Puckey”……..
Strike “Financial” substitute “environmental” I have no idea what the apple programmers are smoking……
I hope so. I have a box of matches and am ready to light the bonfire. I am totally angry that because of these greenies, in 10 years of retirement, I have gone from having a nice warm house in winter to having to turn the heat down 5 degrees and don loads of woolies to keep warm. Even more galling is that I know these middle class morons on their 40 grand a year or more, can afford to put solar panels on their houses and get free electricity and a profit at my expense.
Wonderful news. Being it on. Reality.
Tnx Eric, for this uplifting post.
For what it’s worth i watched an interview with a group of young voters from Birmingham and one of them said they’d all voted for remain on facebook but he thought they may have forgotten to go and vote in the referendum.
How helpful of them!
It is to be willfully ignorant and stupid to assume that the only way that environmental concerns are taken care of is to impose regulations by a totalitarian, unelected EU Commission. Each country can enact all the same regulations or do it in a more democratic manner by passing relevant laws, to which the people would be willing to comply since they and their elected representatives passed them.
Environmentalists are inherently liberal and assume that people have to be forced to do good things. Actually they could not be more wrong. I believe that the average individual is indeed an environmentalist, he/she cleans things, fixes things, takes care of their property, grow things, has an interest in the environment being a nice place to be and live. Liberals assume the average individual is a blithering 2-year old that must be ordered about and forced to comply; liberals having the arrogance of believing that anything they think of, no matter how stupid, must be brilliant.
In fact, having laws and their rationales worked over by discussions in Parliament or a Congress is a horribly healthy thing, as it would allow both large and small errors to be corrected. Only from an unelected, unanswerable group of all-powerful commissioners, such as the EU Commission in Brussels, would you get this:
June 27, 2016
“EU bans claim that water can prevent dehydration.
Brussels bureaucrats were ridiculed yesterday after banning drink manufacturers from claiming that water can prevent dehydration.”
One has to wonder what these guys are smoking shen they come up with such patently erroneous conclusions and regulations.
Should be: Bonfire of “Green” regulations.
Bonfire could be literal. Green is a euphemism, hence quotes. They are mostly to do with promoting vested industrial interests such as wind turbine manufacture and diesel cars. Nothing to do with protecting the environment.
“Regulations set in place to help fight climate change and protect Britain’s wildlife may be destroyed following the Brexit result, top environmentalists have warned.”
Well good riddance, the regulations can do nothing to effect the climate measurably, and the only climate change we need to fight in the future is the onset of glaciation.
Sooooo, Greenpeace is claiming that prior to entering the EU, bathwater in Britain wasn’t safe?
The beaches were filthy with sewage, that’s for sure. EU blue flag scheme forced clear up govts wouldn’t previously undertake
Come on Griff, you used to make your nonsense deflections a little less transparent. You didn’t even try here. No entertainment value at all.
From Nuccitelli… Think of the children! Brexit = GW de-nial
The inter-generational theft of Brexit and climate change
Youth will bear the brunt of the poor decisions being made by today’s older generations
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2016/jun/27/the-inter-generational-theft-of-brexit-and-climate-change
The Brexit fear mongering has already reached shrill proportions. Soon they will reach ludicrous speed!