There has been a lot of talk on the Left of late about what should be done with those wicked right wingers who dare to question the extent of man's contribution to climate change.
Green Party Leader Natalie Bennett called for all government ministers and advisors who question man's contribution to climate change (even those without an environment brief) to be sacked.
Nailing his authoritarian credentials firmly to the mast, Labour Leader Ed Miliband followed suit to announce during PMQs that if he were in charge, anyone who dared to question man-made climate change (or presumably, anything else in his 'Little Ed Book') will be banished for eternity into political exile.
Australia's John Howard noted that climate change has become a "substitute" for religion. This is true for many on the Left who aggressively denounce those who question their belief as "deniers", a vicious and cynical political ploy adopted to associate those who question man-made climate change with those who deny the genocide of the Jews during World War II. Well, I've been to Auschwitz/Birkenhau and seen the hard and appalling evidence there, but how can this be equated in any way with the mass scientific uncertainties over man-made climate change?
Some of the most active disciples in the religion for climate change are the unelected EU bureaucrats who currently rule over the UK. With the EU environmental coffers standing at a rather generous 20 per cent slice of the seven-year €960 billion EU budget, you can understand their eagerness to promote Doomsday climate change predictions.
Recently, the Environment Council which consists of environment and energy ministers from EU member states met in Brussels to try and fathom out what to do with the EU Commission 2030 climate and energy policy proposal.
The talks were doomed from the start. Thirteen ministers out of the twenty eight are keen to implement the 2030 environment and energy policy by the end of this month. They fear that if the EU fails to do so at the end of March, a global deal on climate change will fail to materialise. Once again this is supranationalism at work - the cutting across of the sovereign responsibilities of nation states.
Frankly, the idea of a global deal on climate change is as impractical as it is frightening. In Japan for example, between 1990 and 2020 its emissions will have risen by 3 per cent - instead of being reduced by 25 per cent. The EU Commission are currently pushing for a 40 per cent reduction in EU carbon emissions by 2030, which would simply destroy the European economy while at the same time the rest of the world carries on regardless.
The Conservative Party is the only political party to commit to an in/out referendum on the EU in 2017. When the British people are given a vote, Britain will have the opportunity to leave the EU.
By withdrawing from the EU political union in favour of a trade relationship such as my EEA-Lite Model, the UK will no longer be subject to the costly, calamitous and extreme energy and environmental policy of the EU.
The UK is currently tied in to a country specific target of 15 per cent of energy to come from renewable sources, although the Commission are now pushing for a 27 per cent EU-wide target by 2030. Even 15 per per cent is an unrealistic target and in order to achieve this the UK will have to plough up to £11 billion of taxpayer's money into the madcap scheme. While Britain remains in the EU, every family in the UK has to contribute £730 to achieve this figure.
This is just one example of the vast savings that will be made when Britain leaves the EU. The UK would no longer be subject to daft EU Directives that cost our nation a fortune - the EU Pollution Directive which costs UK taxpayers £10.4 billion or the Large Combustion Plant Directive, which threatens to turn our lights out by closing a third of our power generation, which seems a bargain in comparison at £1.7 billion.
In addition to the money in the pocket for hard-working families in the UK that will come as a result of ditching disastrous EU environmental and energy policies and reversing EU rises in energy costs, Britain will be back in control of important sovereign areas of policy.
An often forgotten example of EU meddling is the implementation of landfill fines amounting up to 1/25th of all council tax receipts, which led to many local councils reducing bin collections from weekly to fortnightly. Many areas which fell victim to fortnightly collections saw a corresponding increase in illegal dumping, vermin and health problems, which this Government had rightly sought to tackle. But if the UK quits the EU, we can quit the EU landfill fines and weekly services can resume.
Britain leaving the EU and severing ties to pointless EU environmental directives does not mean that the UK would ignore our responsibility for the environment. It means that Britain can develop a rational, costed approach as to the man-made portion of climate change. This is only achievable if British civil servants are divorced from their EU counterparts, the majority of who are environmental fundamentalists - a Green Taliban - with no real understanding of the people they claim to represent.
An independent Britain that is free from the trappings of the EU can begin to engage with its people once again. The most recent Ipsos Mori polling on issues facing Britain found that despite the wettest two months on record in the South of England, the British public do not rate the environment as one of their top ten issues facing Britain. The fact the EU is wasting such vast sums of money on the pet project of unelected dictats in Brussels shows the level of contempt they have for the public.
Interestingly, the same poll found the two top issues facing Britain are the economy and immigration, two issues the EU has too much control over and which only British independence can resolve.