From Dr M. Asciak MD

The budget presented this week breaks new ground in many ways. One can say that the eco has landed in the social market! The concept of the polluter pays principle has clearly become ingrained in public finances and willy-nilly in the public’s perceptions. He or she who leaves a large carbon footprint will also, from now on, have to put money in the public coffer. It will be painful, it will not be popular but it is the only way that people can be held responsible and really think about the environment in their financial considerations.

The registration tax has gone up according to the years the car has been on the road and consumption of fossil fuels per cubic centimetre. That is the way it should be. Cars alone are the highest cause of pollution in any industrialised country. The fuel subsidy question also needed to be tackled in a responsible manner. Alternative energy sources need to be given a good push now and this is just what the budget does. The time for sitting on the fence is over, and now is the time, four years away from the next election, to carry this paradigm shift to fruition. It is essential for all levels of government to act in synchrony with this new mentality. All government ministers and heads of departments should now gradually do away with their high-octane cars and either go electric or hybrid! The best teachers are those who lead by example!

People will complain but they should be slowly taught to come out of their glass houses and realise that energy issues and global warming are issues for all to tackle by making personal choices rather than by a few at the top (or bottom). The environmental issues will now figure with the economic and social ones when people consider buying a car for example. They will feel the weight of the environmental issues on their shoulders and in their pockets too.

This may not be popular (for now) but it is ethically good, and national budgets should be tailored to fit the summum bonum, the common good, rather than what is most popular or expedient (except the one before an election – I’ll admit that). It is precisely at this juncture that one ought to be extremely careful how to tread. What constitutes the common good has up till now been interpreted according to what St Thomas had originally intended, that is the objective good of the community as a whole. There is a good that can be discerned by reason and which can be categorized in the lesser or most optimal. John Finnis (Natural Law – Coverdale) however shows that the concept of the common good today may easily be pushed out of the objective into the subjective sphere as a concept, where it becomes utility’s greatest happiness for the greatest number. In a democracy that is always a present danger (although maybe lesser so than in an autocratic regime, as the issue is determined by a greater number of people). There could be those in the State who may wish to underline this point and avoid a descent into a relativistic concept of the common good. For the Church today, I believe that it should be one of its paramount objectives.

Michael Asciak