Discussion of Brexit and the environment leads our roundup of some of the most interesting comment on the site today. We’re also looking at your reaction to a piece about keeping pets and the UK’s “failing” education system.
To join in the conversation you can click on the links in the comments below to expand and add your thoughts. We’ll continue to highlight more comments worth reading as the day goes on.
Only revolutionary new laws can stop Brexit harming the environment
Michael Jacobs writes that while Michael Gove has promised an independent watchdog, legally enforceable targets are what is actually required.
‘Some things are best done together’
The UK is well ahead of most of the EU as regards climate change [policies], but perhaps not so much in other areas like plastic waste, sewage discharges and local pollution.
On climate change, the harm might come from the EU losing the UK’s example. If it allows Austria and Germany to set energy policies, then expect the environment to be harmed.
The other point is that some things are best done together. The EU may have dropped the ball on diesel emissions, but this is still something best tackled collectively. The UK isn’t going to impose its own standards.
EnviroCapitalist
‘Money and trade will always trump the environment’
One of the problems is that we will be exporting problems in exchange for trade deals. So, when we accept hormone treated beef from the US and Australia or soya beans from South America, we will be supporting where these products come from and their producers. What we, as a country, do on plastics or pretty much anything else will be pretty meaningless unless we are part of a mutually beneficial trading bloc ... Money and trade will always trump the environment.
chymist
Fish or feline? How to choose the right-sized pet for your home
Debate continues to gather pace beneath Emine Saner’s shortcut on picking pets suitable for your living spaces.
‘If you don’t have space PLEASE don’t have a dog’
I’ve two labradors in my house (note, not flat) in London and they have free range running around the garden via a dog flap in the kitchen door. If I didn’t have a garden - or very, very easy access to one - I wouldn’t have a dog, and I think that the current fashion for dogs of a certain size or shape may mess with the genetic makeup of them as they are bred solely for this purpose. If you don’t have space PLEASE don’t have a dog.
JWCChristiansen
Teachers have sounded the alarm – it’s time to listen
Dawn Foster writes about malnourished children, pupils with no school place, and growing teacher workloads in an education “system under unbearable strain”.
‘It’s about time people woke up to this failed system’
Another example of where privatisation works for the bosses of these so called ‘free schools’ paid for by taxpayers, but who will only teach the ‘easy’ pupils in order to maintain the grants which pay the heads high salaries. It’s about time people woke up to this failed system and get back local control through elected councillors.
Too many cases of the relatives of the heads or governors being given jobs or contracts with apparently little control by the government which funds them.
TheDudleyOmmer
Comments have been edited for length. This article will be updated throughout the day with some of the most interesting ways readers have been participating across the site.
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