PCS general secretary FRAN HEATHCOTE explains why opposing war is inseparable from defending jobs, wages and public services – and why readers should come to the London Peace Conference on Saturday June 20
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Mass insulation meets the Jevons Paradox
A planned carbon capture storage plant sits uneasily alongside continued inaction on home insulation — how can we make sure any new ‘efficiency’ does not lead to greater consumption — and should we, ask ROX MIDDLETON, LIAM SHAW and JOEL HELLEWELL
In England, there are nearly seven million homes with solid walls. Currently, less than 10 per cent of those have solid insulation. The situation is better for homes with cavity walls: out of 16 million, nearly 70 per cent have cavity insulation — although that means that five million remain without.
As protests erupt over Henry Nowak’s murder, ANDREW MURRAY argues that anger is being exploited to advance a wider racist and anti-immigration agenda
CARLOS MARTINEZ explains the sound case for car manufacturing co-operation with China
The National Emergency Briefing outlines the need for urgent action to address environmental crisis, says PAUL DONOVAN, warning that there’s no time to indulge the arguments of the fossil-fuel-funded climate-change deniers
Campaigners say criticism of Labour MP Stephen Morgan’s position on Gaza has been met with police intervention and cancelled opportunities for debate. HESTER WOLFE reports
The Committee for the Defence of Iranian People’s Rights warns of escalation danger in Iran war
IN 1865, the English economist William Stanley Jevons wrote a book called The Coal Question. In it, he considered a paradoxical fact about technological progress.
One might assume that increases in the efficiency of burning coal would mean that there would be a corresponding reduction in its use because less was needed to achieve the same aims. But as Jevons noted, “it is wholly a confusion of ideas to suppose that the economical use of fuel is equivalent to a diminished consumption. The very contrary is the truth.”
The Jevons Paradox states that increases in efficiency lead to increases in demand. A century-and-a-half later, it remains depressingly relevant.
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