Every time I read a reference to COP26 I’m transported to a rural parish, some time ago, where a benevolent old bobby strolls along his beat from his police house in Letsby Avenue, checking for anything suspicious, including unlocked doors, untaxed cars, unwelcome visitors and unsightly rubbish.
He’s armed with nothing more than stout boots, a commodious notebook, a flashlight and a break-time sandwich filled with the policeman’s favourite, truncheon meat. Spike Milligan once memorably quipped that policemen are numbered in case they get lost, but Cop 26 would know every inch of his patch.
Incidentally, the brilliant Milton Jones cautioned that if you’re being chased by a police dog, try not to go through a tunnel, then on to a little seesaw, then jump through a hoop of fire; they’re trained for that.
Old Cop 26 reawakens a bygone era when all police looked older than you, apparently said “evening all” regardless of time of day and could admonish miscreants with simply a sharp word or well-placed poke in the privates. Nowadays, call simultaneously from your house for a pizza and the police and it’s odds-on the pizza will arrive first.
The real COP26 is, of course, the major climate change conference in Glasgow at the end of October. Just as well it’s approaching fast as, by all accounts, our planet is doomed unless we do something drastic about climate chaos.
Thankfully, most western countries seem to have shifted from myopic Trump-style assertions that climate change is simply a leftist plot to a sensible realisation that we’re in serious doo-doo and heading for a similar fate to the dodo. I’m not totally sure they feel the same in the Middle East and much of Asia, Africa and China, though.
Unfortunately, COP26 might be the worst thing that has ever happened climatologically, because it involves short-term politicians. They’re almost guaranteed to set unrealistic targets like a turkey planning for a wee relaxing holiday once the festive rush is past. COP26 will doubtless generate dozens of knee-jerk policies to secure their short-term popularity.
If we’re serious about climate catastrophe, let COP26 be held virtually so that none of the delegates need to use a jet to fly here. Let our globe-trotting ministers take the lead by giving up air travel and petrol-powered vehicles and turn the House of Commons restaurants vegetarian.
We’ll have to eschew cheap holidays and cruises in the sun. We’ll have to say goodbye to Lochaber’s iconic Jacobite steam locomotives as they’re coal-powered, and to vintage aircraft such as the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight. This weekend’s first ever Royal Deeside Motor Show could ironically be the last for classic vehicles.
It’s the death knell for diesel-powered rail routes north of Edinburgh until they’re electrified, which is probably as likely as tennis superstar Maria Sharapova turning up at Fyne Place during her current Scottish holiday and asking me for a quick rally. If she did, my soaring temperature would only add to global warming.
Still, back to the climate. The point is that we desperately need a sensible transition to greener policies, not a sudden stop like a train hitting the buffers. A speedy transition, yes, but one that we can all buy into and change our lives to make a real difference, not sticking-plaster, headline-grabbing, easy-to-hit political targets.
It’s not PC, but COP26 must be pragmatic. Perhaps we might scrap police cars and have future successors to my fictional Cop 26 climb back on their squeaky boneshaker bikes, chasing felons escaping on battery-powered e-scooters.
Maybe Ms Sharapova and I could retire to a Highland eco-yurt and live forever on wild berries while wearing nothing but leaves. This autumn could be very revealing.
