GENOCIDAL SELFISHNESS

"The scale of devastation is so great that it is hard to believe the truth behind it, or how it is possible that so many people remain ignorant of this crisis."

Thus spake Dr Rajendra Pachauri, chair of the UN intergovernmental panel on climate change. Dr Pachauri was commenting on a report just published by the Global Humanitarian Forum, former UN secretary general Kofi Annan's thinktank. The report states that climate change is currently causing 300,000 deaths annually. Climate change is also causing economic losses amounting to £78bn per year.

Naturally, perhaps, when faced with disaster on an unimaginable scale, there are those who try to convince themselves that the problem does not exist. Alternatively, it is possible still to imagine that climate change is a problem for the future.

But those 300,000 deaths are happening now. According to Dr Pachauri, "Four billion people are vulnerable now and 500 million are now at extreme risk."

The Global Humanitarian Forum's report is based on information provided by the World Bank, the World Health Organisation, the UN, the Potsdam Institute, leading insurance companies and major charities, such as Oxfam. Dr Pachauri described it as "the most plausible possible estimate of the human impact of climate change today."

Three hundred thousand people dying, every year, as a direct result of climate change. Not some time in the future. Now. And that number is only going to rise.

And VVASP's response to this crisis?

As they announced in the Evesham Journal last week, the cosseted cretins who represent a minority view in the Lenches villages have joined a European consortium, the European Platform Against Windfarms (EPAW), with the intention of forcing a Europe-wide moratorium on windfarm development.

According to VVASP, the Lenchwick Windfarm would "threaten residents' quality of life". Not necessarily true, of course - VVASP have been caught out repeatedly lying about windfarms - and even if it were true, it seems a small sacrifice to make in the face of 300,000 deaths caused annually by climate change.

Oh, but don't worry - 98% of those affected by climate change are in developing countries. So VVASP does not have to worry about them.

I think we all know that barely anybody in the Lenches had a problem with windfarms until very recently. I think we can safely say that, if they ever thought about them, most villagers thought they were a pretty good idea. Until a plan was revealed to develop one in their neighbourhood.

At that point, a small number of self-centred people started digging up any old lie, myth and rumour they could about windfarms. They went out of their way to mislead their neighbours about them. They forced parish councillors to resign so that they could take over local decision making. They thrust their sick and diseased propaganda through doors and they actively stifled anything in the way of discussion or debate.

The ONLY problem they have with windfarms is that they might be able to see a turbine from their garden. Everything else they've said about these things - all the lies about noise, inefficiency, wildlife, health and house prices - is just a blind.

These people feel that their little rural haven should be ringfenced, that somebody else should have the responsibility for producing their energy, that they are somehow exempt from the issue. They have a little bit of money and they believe that they are therefore different, special. They truly believe that they are entitled to campaign against clean, cheap, safe energy because it might affect them in a small way.

And as we have seen, their campaign tactics are despicable.

More despicable, however, is their latest move. So deranged are these people, so determined to shirk their responsibilities at this time of global crisis, that they will conspire with their fellow lunatics across Europe to try and stop any windfarms being built. Not because windfarms are bad. Because they don't want one near them.

300,000 people dying because of climate change. Four billion people vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change. Economic losses of £78bn caused by climate change. Now.

And the selfish bastards of VVASP want to stop all windfarms in Europe, because it would upset them to have to see a turbine.

Let's give VVASP and their campaign the word it deserves.

It is not enough to point out that they are misguided, deluded, and narrow-minded. Selfishness on this scale, and in the face of so many, many people around the world suffering right now, there is only one word to describe VVASP and their stupid, crazed, self-centred campaign.

That word is EVIL.