These include reducing the UK’s dependence on imported hydrocarbons so we can increase energy security and reduce carbon output. We also have cross-party agreement on the need [...]]]> Over the past five years, many of us involved in national politics have worked together – across the political divides – to establish a consensus on fundamental ecological issues.

These include reducing the UK’s dependence on imported hydrocarbons so we can increase energy security and reduce carbon output. We also have cross-party agreement on the need to find much better ways of slowing down the water cycle so we do not waste so much of our increasingly precious water.

And the reduction and recycling of solid waste is the third shared national agenda.

These three agendas work together. By slowing down the water cycle and reducing waste or making much better use of waste products, we can also conserve energy.

So far, so good.

But how do we translate these admirable national ambitions into results on the ground?

Part of the answer, of course, has to lie in governments adopting particular policies that change rules and incentives to move us in the right direction. The creation of feed-in tariffs in the electricity system and the establishment of recycling incentives in the local government finance system are just two examples of the wide range of national measures that are needed.

But rules and incentives will carry us only some of the way. There have to be people at the other end who obey the rules and respond to the incentives. And we won’t really make the progress we need until the culture changes from the bottom up.

This is where local, voluntary effort has such a big part to play.

Bridport TLC is a splendid example of such bottom-up voluntary effort – and I am proud to have been a supporter of it for a long time now.
Of course, given our current economic and fiscal circumstances, it isn’t going to be easy for central government or local governments anywhere in Britain to do as much as we would all like to support such bottom-up effort – and of course local governments of all kinds have to be very careful to vet all their spending. But I hope that, over coming years, we shall see support for the recycling effort at all levels of government, despite the inevitable financial squeeze.

But there is a problem.

I think it is right to christen this problem “the gang-master syndrome”.

I choose this name because the law on gang-masters is the classic example that best illustrates the problem.

Some years back, there was the ghastly incident of cockle-pickers being drowned [...]]]> At first sight, dangerous dog insurance looks like a reasonable proposition.

But there is a problem.

I think it is right to christen this problem “the gang-master syndrome”.

I choose this name because the law on gang-masters is the classic example that best illustrates the problem.

Some years back, there was the ghastly incident of cockle-pickers being drowned when working for gang-masters: I am sure that some readers of this column will remember it. Following this ghastly incident, which shocked the whole nation, there was a knee-jerk reaction from the government which satisfied the calls for “action” from some quarters by creating a new law.

And what was the effect? Answer: the legitimate gang-masters who were already obeying the existing law now had to obey another law which didn’t really affect their behaviour, except that they had to fill out more forms and deal with more regulators. And the grisly, shady end of the trade, who exploit workers and were responsible for the appalling fate of the cockle-pickers, are all too likely to be unaffected — because there is a high chance that no-one actually enforces this new law against them any better than they enforced the old laws.

The latest proposals on dangerous dogs fall into exactly the same category. Mrs Charming – a frail, elderly person who happens to own a harmless example of a supposedly dangerous breed of dog – will now be subjected to considerable extra bureaucracy if the current proposals see the light of day. By contrast, Mr Thug – who terrorises his neighbours with the vicious brutes that he keeps around him – will pay no attention whatsoever to the new legislation.

And please tell me, how many readers of this column actually believe that the police are going to stop each and every owner of each and every relevant dog to find out whether the law is being enforced?

I will bet my bottom dollar that, if any checking at all goes on, it will affect the law-abiding rather than the lawless. Mr Thug will be left in peace and it will be Mrs Charming whose insurance papers are checked.

This is as true in the case of rules [...]]]> It is often said that hard cases make bad law – and the thought behind this cliché is surely right. It isn’t possible to construct general rules that will work well for most people most of the time by thinking of the most difficult and exceptional cases.

This is as true in the case of rules about migration as it is in any other field. One has to start by asking what rules are likely to produce sensible results most of the time.

Once one poses the question this way, some of the answers become pretty clear. I suspect that the overwhelming majority of our fellow countrymen would agree with the view that our welfare system is not capable of withstanding the financial strain that would be involved in making benefit payments to anybody and everybody who might wish to migrate to the UK.

So it is perfectly sensible to have a general rule that, before people can be given entry to the UK from other countries outside the EU, they have to show that they can support themselves without recourse to public funds.

But there are, of course, other things that need to be taken into account when designing a set of rules about migration. And one of these is the general principle that British citizens ought to have the right to a family life with the partner of their choice. This is why the system also generally permits people to enter the country if they are (genuinely) married to UK citizens.

But what happens if these two principles come into conflict, or appear to come into conflict with one another?

This is where you hit the hard cases. Perfectly sensible general rules do not always look so sensible when a particular case comes to light.

What is the solution? Another set of rules for deciding how to solve conflicts between the rules? A new task force or quango? Surely not.

What is required when one hits a hard case is a bit of commonsense and human sympathy exhibited by the officials called upon to make decisions under the rules.

I am afraid my experience over the last 13 years has been that such commonsense and human sympathy is not always shown in resolving the hard cases. A surprisingly large part of the activity of a constituency MP consists of trying to help particular constituents obtain these two magic ingredients from the bureaucracy

It is all top-down. And it is basically the same system that was set up in the 1940s and 1950s.

But we are now entering a [...]]]> At present, almost all our electricity comes from big power stations that feed into the national grid. The electricity is then distributed downwards through a system of descending voltages.

It is all top-down. And it is basically the same system that was set up in the 1940s and 1950s.

But we are now entering a new age in which this top-down system is going to be transformed into something much more like an electricity internet. With “smart meters” in very house, a “smart grid” and plug-in hybrid electric cars with on board “smart technology”, we are going to have a much more interactive and responsive modern network.

Instead of just sending electricity down from on high to meet customer demand, the machinery in our homes and our cars will be programmed so that we can enable it to take electricity from the system at times of the day when electricity is plentiful and cheap – whether to recharge a car or keep the freezer frozen – but to switch off (or even in the case of cars, to deliver electricity into the system) when there is a sudden shortage and prices go high.

One component of this new electricity internet will be a huge increase in the number of households that make some of their own electricity – diminishing the need for big power stations and completing the picture of an interactive system that is no longer just pumping electricity down the wire to the home.

The advantages, if we can get all of this up and running during the next decade, are huge. As well as saving energy on a large scale and saving carbon emissions too, we can provide more energy security through a system that is more resilient and less exposed to global variations in the supply and price of oil and gas.

But – as Scandinavian countries and Germany have shown – to get over the hump and make this new electricity internet a reality, we need a clear system of “feed-in tariffs”, so that people who instal low carbon micro-generation (whether solar or ground source heat pumps or micro-combined heat and power or small wind turbine) can receive a pre-determined payment for each kilo watt hour of electricity they generate. Those of us who began agitating for a system like this some years ago are now delighted to see that this is a matter of political consensus – and, while there are lots of arguments raging about the details of the “feed-in tariffs” now being introduced, the big thing at this stage is to move forward, and get the new arrangements in place. We can then all see how effective they are in bringing forward micro-generation – and make adjustments as necessary over coming years.

But the paradox is that allotments are also a thoroughly fashionable and modern concept. As people become more and more concerned about the origin of [...]]]> There is something wonderfully English and old-fashioned about allotments. They conjure up images of the 1940s – a resilient nation, growing its own in the face of food shortages and rationing.

But the paradox is that allotments are also a thoroughly fashionable and modern concept. As people become more and more concerned about the origin of the food they are eating, and more and more inclined to promote local food, the allotment becomes a more and more attractive idea.

Over coming years, the trend towards growing more for ourselves of what we eat is likely, if anything, to intensify. Shifts in the diet of two billion increasingly prosperous people in China and India, and the prospect of reducing food production in Africa due to climate change will increase pressure on world food security. We will need to make more effort to match food supply with food demand in Britain.

Of course, allotments by themselves are not going to cure all of these problems. We need – and we are indeed beginning to experience – a revolution in local food production.

Farmers in West Dorset and elsewhere are increasingly, and rightly, branding their products and selling much more directly into local markets. The woeful commoditisation of agriculture that occurred in the second half of the last century is being gradually reversed. Modern techniques are being used to make food that has old-fashioned virtues and hence more appeal to the modern consumer.

But, even if allotments aren’t the whole answer, they can play a significant role in increasing food security. So we should surely be finding ways of encouraging them in the Bridport area, in West Dorset more widely and in the country as a whole.

Besides, the pleasure that people take from cultivating a plot – and the thrill of eating something that you have nurtured from seedling to plate is a therapeutic gain that can only do good things for the people involved and for society at large.

So the question is: how do we conjure up little parcels of land which can be devoted to these benevolent uses?

There isn’t, of course, a single solution. Having been involved in efforts to find pieces of earth for allotments in various places in West Dorset, I can testify to the fact that it is not an easy task.

But we shouldn’t let that put us off. With ingenuity and persistence, we should be able to find bits of land here and there which are, for one reason or another, lying idle – and each little conquest contributes to the achievement of a much larger victory.

Count the square metres, and the hectares will gradually take care of themselves.

But there is one kind of pollution about which the law is still remarkably tolerant – noise pollution.

You can drive an extremely noisy motor bike [...]]]> Nowadays, concern with pollution is definitely ‘in’. We worry about the ecology of air, water and land. And we have thousands of regulations to prevent them being contaminated by noxious substances.

But there is one kind of pollution about which the law is still remarkably tolerant – noise pollution.

You can drive an extremely noisy motor bike up and down Britain’s roads, even late at night on residential streets. You can shatter the peace of Lyme Bay by rushing around in an extremely noisy speed boat. And you can walk around, playing incredibly loud music on a ghetto blaster — without anybody official so much as lifting an eyebrow.

I suppose one could regard this as a sublime example of social tolerance.

In my experience, people in West Dorset don’t, by and large, share that view. They are inclined to regard the free rein given to noise not as a sign of laudable tolerance but as a sign that we haven’t yet legally recognised the great value of peace and quiet.

Indeed, one of the biggest items in my postbag over the years has been complaints from people whose neighbours are disturbing them.

I have to admit that my own prejudices are all on the side of the peace-lovers. I hate being surrounded by loud noise and I especially dislike it when it is somebody else’s loud noise.

But, even disregarding such personal preferences, there must surely be some limits to what anybody can reasonably be expected to tolerate by way of noise disturbance from somebody else. When the noise is enormous, and it is going on very late at night, that limit has surely been breached.

Of course, there are all sorts of delicate questions of interpretation and definition here. One person’s ordinary party is another person’s intolerably loud noise. One person’s quiet enjoyment of music is another person’s nightmare. One person’s lifestyle choice is another person’s life-destroyer.

Adjudicating between these competing and conflicting descriptions of the same events is not an easy task for the authorities.

But we shouldn’t make the best the enemy of the good – and, despite all the difficulties of definition, I think it really is reasonable to demand a degree of social responsibility when people are making noise, especially when other people are trying to sleep.

If somebody in authority steps in when such responsibility is notably absent – far from complaining about official officiousness – I would be inclined to give a cheer.

But, in the midst [...]]]> So far as the country as a whole is concerned, it will not surprise readers of this column to know that I hope 2010 will be a year for change. Both literally and metaphorically, we can’t afford to go on in the way we have been doing for the last 13 years.

But, in the midst of much anxiety about our nation’s future, I think it’s worth bearing in mind the things locally, here in West Dorset, that are worth preserving rather than changing. And there are many of them.

The most obvious point — not just about Bridport and its surroundings but also about the whole world heritage coastline and the hinterland that lies behind it — is the incredible beauty of our landscape. No-one with any aesthetic sensibility can avoid a sharp intake of breath as Abbotsbury and the Chesil come into view on the coastal road, or at the sight of the western cliffs of  Lyme Bay from Pilsdon Pen.

Preserving and enhancing those  sublime vistas — and the quieter, but no less compelling charm of the villages and land of the Marshwood Vale, or of the Bride Valley — must surely remain one of our great aims, not just for 2010 but for all the years beyond.

We have this beauty on loan to us, and we have a duty to be its stewards.

But, alongside this rich natural treasure, there is also a social inheritance of inestimable worth — the community spirit that pervades our towns and villages.

Yes, of course there are tensions and hostilities from time to time in particular places. But these are far out matched by the extraordinary willingness of people to come together in communal activity. The Bridport CAB, the community pub at Shipton Gorge, the community shop at Thorncombe, the historical records centre at Burton Bradstock, riding for the disabled in Bradpole,  the vast multitude of clubs and societies and events within a few miles of the centre of Bridport — all of these attest to the thriving spirit of social enterprise and mutual support.

As we face what will, alas, be for many a difficult year, we should recommit ourselves to sustaining and nurturing these wonderful examples of social responsibility.  And those of us involved in politics at all levels should be seeking  ways of lightening the bureaucratic load that too often inhibits their expansion and unnecessarily absorbs their energy.

But also a time to recall that, for some, this is the most difficult moment in the year – a moment when loneliness and anxiety are accentuated by the fact that so many families are gathering convivially to share the festivities. Years ago, when I [...]]]> Christmas approaches. A time for celebration – in Bridport as elsewhere.

But also a time to recall that, for some, this is the most difficult moment in the year – a moment when loneliness and anxiety are accentuated by the fact that so many families are gathering convivially to share the festivities. Years ago, when I first visited what was then called Crisis at Christmas, it came home to me that, for people who either haven’t got friends or relations or, for one reason or another, are separated from them and stranded alone, Christmas can be anything but convivial.

Crisis itself – and many other wonderful voluntary bodies besides – do marvellous work in partly, at least, making good this deficiency.

But, in the end, there isn’t any real substitute for friends and relations. As the tale of Mr Scrooge abundantly shows, no amount of material prosperity will fill the gap created by the absence of people you are fond of at Christmas. And it is a bitter irony that there are people in West Dorset and everywhere else in the country who find themselves in this position – some, desperately poor; others, much better off; but all deprived of the social fabric that makes Christmas what it is for the rest of us.

Restoring this social fabric, where it has disintegrated, is the most important single thing that we could do to mend the broken parts of our society – but it is also one of the most difficult.

Part of the answer, here, is to recognise that there is often a considerable distance between action and effect.

I have noticed this particularly during the past couple of months as a result of being one of the many people in my own village of Thorncombe who helps out with serving at our new community shop.

Bringing this new shop into existence has had an extraordinary effect on the village. As one person said to me the other day, “I have met and talked to more people in the village in this shop in the last few weeks than in the last 10 years”. The fact of doing something together (and of being so delighted with the incredibly smart and welcoming shop that the village has created) has forged an enormous amount of what the sociologists call “social capital”.

In other words, the social fabric is being restored, not by some fancy scheme or commission, but by the people of the village themselves coming together to do something together that makes them feel part of something.

And that, surely, is the real spirit of Christmas.

We simply can’t go on like this, being massively and increasingly exposed to fluctuations in price and security of supply – especially when the oil and [...]]]> Quite regardless of what you think about the risks from carbon emissions and climate change, freeing Britain from excessive dependence on imported oil and gas is an urgent national necessity.

We simply can’t go on like this, being massively and increasingly exposed to fluctuations in price and security of supply – especially when the oil and gas comes largely from the Middle East, Russia and North Africa. These are hardly parts of the world on which you would want to be most dependent.

But moving from where we are to a low-carbon economy doesn’t mean going back to living like monks in the Middle Ages. It means using sensible modern technologies. That way, we can sustain our quality of life without being overly dependent on imported hydro-carbons.

Lots of the action has to lie with government. Only government can bring about the building of a smart grid, a high-speed rail system and a network of charging points for plug-in hybrid cars.

Some of the rest of what needs to be done depends on the big businesses of Britain. Whether it is producing the plug-in hybrid cars to plug into the charging points, or operating a high-speed rail system or managing a smart grid, only big business can do it.

But there is also an enormous part that has to be played by individuals and communities at a much more local level.

If all the farms and all the local authorities in this country used their waste to feed bio-digesters, the national grid estimates that we could produce about 40% of our heating gas just from those two sources.

And it is individuals, not government or big businesses, that need to make the choices – to buy the plug-in hybrid cars, to travel on the high-speed trains, to save money by insulating homes and replacing inefficient boilers, and in short to do sensible and cost-effective things that also contribute to the decarbonisation of our economy.

In other words, this isn’t a question of either/or. It is a question of both/and.

Government, big businesses, communities and individuals all need to play a part. The crucial point is that we shouldn’t think of this as a series of terrible sacrifices in order to insure ourselves against an uncertain risk.

What we need to do is simply to take advantage nationally, commercially, communally and individually of the big gains that modern technology has opened up for us. There’s a bright, low-carbon future out there. We just have to grab it.

The answer clearly lies in that mysterious item: fashion.

There is hardly ever any simple reason why a fashion gets going. Who knows what makes everyone suddenly think that mini skirts are in or out?

These fashions can, of course, be about matters of life and death. A few decades [...]]]> Why has binge drinking become such a problem?

The answer clearly lies in that mysterious item: fashion.

There is hardly ever any simple reason why a fashion gets going. Who knows what makes everyone suddenly think that mini skirts are in or out?

These fashions can, of course, be about matters of life and death. A few decades back, it was commonplace for reasonable and decent people to think nothing of having a few drinks before driving. Nowadays, we think of this as a pretty murderous activity.

The fashion has changed so far as drink-driving is concerned, and there are people living today who would be dead if the fashion hadn’t changed.

This example of drink driving is highly relevant to the question of binge drinking amongst the young. It wasn’t just breathalysers that changed public attitudes to people having “one for the road”. Change in the law without a change in the fashion would certainly not have brought about anything like the shift in behaviour that we have all witnessed.

In much the same way, we need to combine changes in the law with subtle ways of nudging people into changing behaviour if we really want to put a brake on binge drinking.

The legal side of this is fairly clear. A good start would be to ban the sale of below cost drinks in supermarkets, and to raise the tax on the particularly strong drinks which are most used by binge drinkers.

The difficult bit is to find a clever way of nudging young people into thinking that getting blind drunk on a Friday night is not cool.

This requires a huge imaginative effort – because just preaching at people won’t do the trick. There is no substitute, here, for experimentation. One really can’t tell in advance what will work – and one just has to try a series of different things in the hope that some of them will begin to shift the fashion.

A psychological experiment recently showed that when hotels put notices in their bathrooms asking their guests not to steal the bathrobes, it had no effect; but when the hoteliers put notices saying that “guests in this hotel who want to take a bathrobe home almost always buy one at reception”, that did the trick.

The question is: what is the equivalent of the bathrobe notice in this case?