WHILE there are significant gaps between reality and the policies of the British governing elite on many issues, arguably none is wider and more terrifying than the ongoing climate chasm.

The frightening reality of the worsening climate crisis should be clear to anyone paying attention. So while the Guardian recently published the headline “Deal to keep 1.5°C hopes alive is within reach, says Cop28 president,” in 2021 the top climate scientist Dr James Hansen had already noted: “There is now no chance whatever of keeping global warming below 1.5°C.”

As he argued earlier this year: “We are not moving into a 1.5°C world, we are briefly passing through it in 2024. We will pass through the 2°C world in the 2030s unless we take purposeful actions to affect the planet’s energy balance.”