Every little helps to protect the future generations
READING the Guernsey Press on Thursday 3 October, the double page piece by Deputy Peter Roffey I found excellent. All about the problems of the climate change which will affect our future generation, no doubt about it. It is great to see schoolchildren marching for change; as I have mentioned, it is their future.
As Peter quoted, when he was born there were fewer than three billion people on Earth, now we are looking at seven billion and it is increasing year on year, and of course affecting the resources of our planet Earth.
‘What can our small island achieve in order to help the situation?’ we all ask.
Firstly we need to start asking the question of the over-development of our island. In the same-dated newspaper I read three pieces about housing developments in three different parts of our island. This is a small amount of what the Development & Planning Authority have on their books. When we see the amount of development on our island, it begs the question: do we really need all this housing?
The loss of so much land on our island is becoming quite frightening and no matter how many representations are put forward, they never achieve anything. The amount of greenhouse sites we are losing is quite worrying, sites that could be put back to greenfield sites to help global warming.
Also the problem of the amount of children in schools is a worrying factor, as where are they to live in the future if there isn’t any land left to accommodate them? Our island is in a serious balancing act. Do we need now to start de-populating our island for the future? As Deputy Roffey says, population increase in the world needs looking at.
Serious decisions for the future for all and yet, unless we act now, all our grandchildren will have no future as we all have been lucky to have.
We need a strong government for this island to help for its future, will we people be ready to step forward to take up the mantle?
Not only is the climate a worrying situation, we also have to look at rogue countries like Iran and North Korea developing nuclear weapons which could plunge the world into a much worse situation. These are of course out of Guernsey’s control, but it is such a dramatic worry for our next two generations to come.
Let’s start now what we can do ourselves for Guernsey’s future.
R. S. MAUGER
Valletta,
Rue des Frieteaux,
St Martin’s,
GY4 6XA.
