JIM'S WISH LIST

I was asked if I were given three wishes for this year what would they be.

My immediate response was that our quaint little Prime Minister John Howard should disappear and that his father figure George Dubya Bush do likewise; to which someone listening said 'No, no, not Geoorge Dubya, cos he'll press the button as he goes and wipe us all out.'

Seriously though, I thought, why would I think of these two being made to disappear as my most pressing number one wish?

Of course, it's because I believe climate change is humanity's most urgent and immediate problem. For the world and for Australia, instead of one or both of these two being out in the front giving leadership and guidance, they act as the spokespersons for the coal and oill interests whose only thoughts are money, profit, money and more money before all else, blind to all consequences.

Since the industrial revolution abnout 250 years ago , coal has become mankind's number one energy source, followed by oil's uses being discovered about 150 years ago. The ownership of these two energy sources world-wide have fallen into the hands of a few hundred men who are supported by tens, even hundreds or thousnds of people who push and support their case.

These people and millions of unthinking others still suppport the Victorian notion of 'progress' through economic growth, along with the exploitation of all resources. In that era, no-one realised that as a consequence of this economic growth policy, they were draining the planet of its finite resources. The very word environment hadn't been invented, let alone realising that what they were doing was degrading such a concept.

We have no such excuse today. Nor do our leaders.

At the end of the Victorian era (1900) the entire population of the world was about one billion people. That figure increased sixfold to six billion humans just 2 months before the year 2000 - in just 100 years. All that growth in spite of two world wars and a world-wide flu epidemic (1918-21),, all of which are estimated to have killed more than 85 million people, let alone other wars and diseases in that 100 years.

For planet Earth this huge six billion mass of energy-consuming humanity is now imposing strains on the planet and its resources. It should be obvious that this cannot be sustained.

First in ignorance and then with knowledge, we humans are changing the climate of the Earth. Our hunger for energy (burning coal and oil) releases carbon dioxide which hangs in the atmosphere above us and acts like a blanket.The sun's rays warm the earth, but before the CO2 blanket came into being, some of that warmth was reflected back into space. That warmth is now held close to the earth by the CO2 blanket, thus increasing the Earth's temperature.

As a consequence, Arctic and Antarctic ice caps are melting as are the glaciers in the Himalayas. That cold fresh water is changing ocean currents (it doesn't mix readily with salty ocean water). It is raising ocean levels and temperatures. This is affecting weather patterns around the world – more severe and frequent hurricanes, more drought in sopme places, more floods and landslides in others.

There are now more than six billion people who will be affected, and who contribute to the world wide outpouring of carbon dioxide and other climate-changing gases.

Today in Queensland, more land is cleared per cpita than anywhere else in the world, even Amazonia. Each of us should protest that, or support others that do. Wishing won't change that or the attitudes of the rich and powerful who want wealth at any cost. Nor will prayers (at the risk of offending some of my friends). It is people acting, taking action,, protesting, writing letters, demonstrating, or helping others to do these things, It's also being aware of their own contribution to climate change and taking some action to minimise that contribution.

Having said all of that, can I now wish that the representatives of big business, the Business Council of Australia would stop calling on the government to reduce this tax and that tax each year before the budget is brought down? Taxation is the community's contribution to the whole of society to in part (and in my view should be a major part) help the less fortunate in this society of ours.

Since the inception of big business the wealthy have always objected that they contribute more than others. 'Why just because we are wealthy should we pay a higher rate in the dollar than the rest of society?' Why indeed?

I wish . . .

Really though, climate change is the burning issue – no pun intended. It's people doing something to postpone or ameliorate its consequences that's needed now.

I wish people would understand that.

-Jim Knight