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GOVERNMENT GIVES SOME GOOD GREEN NEWS But Spending Review Still Not Comprehensive Enough
14 July 1998
On transport, FOE Transport Campaigner Tony Bosworth said:
“An extra £2 billion on transport is welcome, and particularly the 150 local integrated transport schemes. An acid test remains whether John Prescott wastes much of it on unnecessary road schemes. Widening the M1, M6 and M25 alone could soak up half straightaway. If the money was spent on alternatives to the car such as buses and cycling facilities, it could help transform our towns and cities and help deliver real traffic reduction across the country."
FOE has also commented on plans to introduce a new Home Energy Efficiency Scheme. Total new spending on housing renovation will be £3.6 billion over 3 years, funded from capital receipts. 1.5 million homes will be covered.
FOE Research Co-ordinator Duncan McLaren said:
“The new scheme is welcome, but appears to cover only about a fifth of the number of households in fuel poverty, many of which include pensioners. A comprehensive programme could eliminate fuel poverty and hence avoid the need for further Government help with pensioner fuel bills.”
FOE has also criticised the continuing waste of Government money on “perverse subsidies”, which damage the environment and the economy. These include the Common Agricultural Policy, which costs UK £3 billion a year, subsidies to the fossil fuel industries,including Petroleum Revenue Tax breaks for the oil industry, which costs more than £1 billion a year, and hidden subsidies to the nuclear power programme, including £3.7 billion on nuclear reprocessing by 1999.
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Published by Friends of the Earth Trust
Last modified: Jul 2008
