A difficult era lies ahead as we grapple with climate change
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The Way I See It by Jim McGillivray
In the past I have charted my way through each year via fixed marks in my calendar.
Among these are the start of the Sutherland amateur football season, the county show, the Dornoch Games, last night of the pipe band in Dornoch Square, and as dark and stormy winter nights beckon, Halloween and Bonfire Night.
Most of these have been sorely missed these last 18 months, but at least the very well-attended torchlight parade last Friday night, marching from Dornoch Square to the flames, fireworks and sideshows at Meadows Park, hints at some normality returning at last, and a welcome revival of community events.
Looking into the sparks rising from the bonfire was an opportunity for some maudlin thinking about where things stand.
The theme of the time is the COP26 conference in Glasgow as the leaders of the nations seek to do exactly what, nobody really knows.
I am as guilty as any in my personal contribution to global warming, but I try to plant trees as often as I can and restrict my driving to a minimum. Small virtues which never quite salve my conscience.
I see there are green lairds of vast personal wealth buying up our land to re-wild (which I presume means planting more trees than I do).
However, I maintain that vast personal wealth can only have been accumulated at the expense of a massive carbon footprint, historical and current, so maybe mine is not the only conscience which needs soothing.
Far better minds than mine are trying to find the scientific and political solutions to our warming world, from nuclear fusion to tidal turbines and even more wind farms.
But it will take a massive effort to wean our society away from the convenience of the internal combustion engine and the centrally heated home.
My thinking points me towards trees and hydrogen – photosynthesis and electrolysis – but whatever the answer I feel we are in for a disrupted and difficult era of change these coming years.
Reassuringly, some things never change. Even though Highland Council was in tier three, the lowest priority for UK Government Levelling-Up funding, I see that Inverness (under the guise of the Inverness, Nairn, Badenoch & Strathspey political constituency) has been awarded £20 million for its Zero Carbon Cultural Regeneration Project.
This the same Inverness which has hogged almost all the multi-million city/region deal money since the inception of that package.
Truly money goes to money. Yet another Inverness vanity project pulls in the dosh while I am left with an unfunded zero-carbon feather-spitting reaction.
On hearing news of this award, I contacted all the Tory MSPs in the Highland region - they must have had some input into the process as representatives of the UK Government.
I suggested that they lift their eyes beyond the regional centre and seek to do something for the economically fragile and increasingly depopulated rural Highlands.
What is good for Inverness is rarely of benefit to the remote hinterland.
Anyway, it’s getting near time to put out the tup. Life goes on.
Retired teacher Jim McGillivray is a long-time resident of Embo and is one of the three Highland councillors representing the East Sutherland and Edderton ward.
