FOLLOWING on from last week on growth, we need to dig deeper, no pun intended.

I said last week that the way forward on growth, is not covering our land with more buildings, but efficiency and reality-based science.

I would like to present a case as evidence that as far as I know, there is nowhere in this country or probably anywhere, that has expanded into virgin land and has not either destroyed or damaged the eco systems and killed the wildlife.

How could it, buildings don’t like trees and fungi, or mice and elephants running in them. It does not suit each other. By the way, fungi are vital for live.

Case study: I use to live in South East London, where the borough of Greenwich lies. In just over 200 years, London has expanded to Greenwich village, making it part of the metropolitan capital, and beyond to Bromley over 12 miles out, and Abbey Wood to the far south-east.

These areas were teeming with wildlife and even deer. Now deer are confined to Greenwich park, and alike, more for show than any other biodiversity reasons. George Monbiot, the writer and environmentalists, has said, that he thinks that growth always damages the environment. The track record seems to prove him right.

So where does this leave humanity?

The honest answer is a rock and a hard place. This does not mean that we can do nothing, but the old order of growth at all costs and playing lip-service to the very thing that keeps us all alive, namely, the natural world, must drastically change.

One of the reasons this government is struggling with growth is we have come to a time frame on planet earth when humans will need to decide to consume less and truly live sustainably or perish along with all the wildlife.

Yes, I know it’s hard to see this when you are living through it, but this will be seen in time to come; if there is anyone left to record it, that we are living at the edge of a crossroad.

Questions like, farmland for food or solar panels and fracking for gas, or new housing estates with no end of ever stopping building until the big cities all merge into one big super slum, and where life is just one big smog filled place to live, does not sound like utopia to me, but the dreaded lands of nightmares.

This situation is well beyond the ability of any minister of state to solve, it needs a team of scientists and planners and thinkers, to come up with a plan of salivation for living in harmony with nature and the planet and possible each other – nothing else will do.

Maybe one day governments may just start with the easy things to do like – solar panels on all new homes and buildings, insulate all buildings properly, water for drinking and growing crops in the UK, energy security, and healthcare that is working for all.

This alone would keep everyone in a job for a long time and bring growth without destroying everything that makes life worth living. Any takers?