Climate Change,the Stern Report and Dog Fouling

I read this week of a climate change expert who has moved his family to higher ground because he thinks we are past the point of no return. Someone said to me that they believed the Stern report which the government commissioned on climate change is basically saying we are heading for the stone age and we should all stop worrying about recycling and flying and instead practice our survival skills. Personally I refuse to give up like that but its hard when you get idiots like the fool who wrote into the local paper last week and said that it was his right to drive three cars and so what if they were “gas guzzlers” (his words)? I would like him to come and tell my children why his gas guzzlers are more important than their lungs. I would like him to to go to every school in the city and tell the pupils why his right to gas guzzlers is more important than their future. The car is not a bad invention. Used well and thoughtfully it can and does enhance lives. There are people whose livelihoods depend on them and any transport policy should reflect that also. But the sheer sick selfishness in that letter made me want to weep. Yet again this week I had folk at my surgery complaining about dog fouling. They rightly made the point that there are very few if any stray dogs in the area (thanks in part to our wardens). This means the owners are letting them use our common space as a toilet. My constituents are right to be angry and I share their anger. How would the dog owners who don’t clean up after their dogs like it if we went and defecated in their garden or front room.That may sound disgusting and I have no intention of doing such a thing but that's how ignorant it is not to clean up after your dog.