London Luton Airport hopes to almost double annual passenger numbers to 32 million by 2043 after the government approved expansion plans, including a new terminal.
It came despite the Planning Inspectorate recommending Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander rejected them over environmental concerns.
Luton Rising, the airport’s owner, said the decision could bring “significant economic, employment and social benefits for our town”.
However, environmental campaigners said “with climate change worsening, the last thing any of us need is 70,000 more aircraft a year”.
Luton was the UK’s fifth busiest airport last year, with 16.9 million people travelling on 132,000 flights.
The expansion plans involve building a new terminal, new taxiways and increasing capacity in the existing terminal, from its current 18 million passengers a year.
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A spokesman for Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer said he was “pleased” with the decision.
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A destroyed mechanic’s shop in downtown Swannanoa, North Carolina, US, December 2024, nearly three months after Hurricane Helene in late September. Photograph: Mike Belleme/The Guardian
Floods, heatwaves and supercharged hurricanes occurred in hottest climate human society has ever experienced
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The world is already deep into the climate crisis, with the WMO report saying that for the first time, the 10 hottest years on record all occurred in the last decade. However, global carbon emissions have continued to rise, which will bring even worse impacts. Experts were particularly critical of the purge of climate scientists and programmes by the US president, Donald Trump, saying that ignoring reality left ordinary people paying the price.
“Leaders must step up – seizing the benefits of cheap, clean renewables for their people and economies – with new national climate plans due this year,” said the UN secretary general, António Guterres.
Dr Luke Parsons, of the Nature Conservancy, said: “Every year, we venture further into uncharted territory, with 2024 the hottest year modern human society has ever experienced. Yet the coming decade is expected to be even hotter, pushing us deeper into this unprecedented climate.”
Previous research determining the role of the climate crisis in what are now unnatural disasters has shown that at least 550 heatwaves, floods, storms, droughts and wildfires had been made significantly more severe or more frequent by global heating.
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Some companies were ending home insurance in California due to wildfires, says Allianz SE board member. He says that without insurance, many other financial services become unviable, from mortgages to investments. Photograph: Mario Tama/Getty Images
Action urgently needed to save the conditions under which markets – and civilisation itself – can operate, says senior Allianz figure
The climate crisis is on track to destroy capitalism, a top insurer has warned, with the vast cost of extreme weather impacts leaving the financial sector unable to operate.
The world is fast approaching temperature levels where insurers will no longer be able to offer cover for many climate risks, said Günther Thallinger, on the board of Allianz SE, one of the world’s biggest insurance companies. He said that without insurance, which is already being pulled in some places, many other financial services become unviable, from mortgages to investments.
Global carbon emissions are still rising and current policies will result in a rise in global temperature between 2.2C and 3.4C above pre-industrial levels. The damage at 3C will be so great that governments will be unable to provide financial bailouts and it will be impossible to adapt to many climate impacts, said Thallinger, who is also the chair of the German company’s investment board and was previously CEO of Allianz Investment Management.
Thallinger said: “The good news is we already have the technologies to switch from fossil combustion to zero-emission energy. The only thing missing is speed and scale. This is about saving the conditions under which markets, finance, and civilisation itself can continue to operate.”
Nick Robins, the chair of the Just Transition Finance Lab at the London School of Economics, said: “This devastating analysis from a global insurance leader sets out not just the financial but also the civilisational threat posed by climate change. It needs to be the basis for renewed action, particularly in the countries of the global south.”
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Palestinians grieve over the bodies of their relatives, who were killed by an Israeli air strike, as they prepare for burial at a hospital in Beit Lahiya, Gaza Strip, April 2, 2025
Meanwhile, Labour government toughens rhetoric against the genocide, but stops short of making any changes in policy or practical support for Israel
ISRAEL is expanding its invasion of Gaza to seize “large areas” to “crush and clean the area,” Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz announced today.
The move came as Gaza’s hospitals reported that an overnight air strike killed more than 50 people, with nearly a dozen being children and a United Nations clinic among the targets.
Mr Katz said the military’s latest offensive in the war-torn strip would involve “seizing large areas that will be added to the security zones of the State of Israel.”
He did not specify which areas of Gaza would be taken over, but called on Gaza residents to “expel Hamas and return all hostages.”
His statement came after Israel ordered the full evacuation of the southern city of Rafah and nearby areas.
The attack was discussed in Parliament today, where Labour toughened its rhetoric against Israel’s actions, but stopped short of offering the slightest change in policy or the practical support it is affording the genocide.
MPs across the Commons pressed the government to be more robust.
Green Party co-leader Carla Denyer said that Israel’s actions were “not about security, but about domination and erasure” of Palestinians.
Asking an urgent Commons question, Ms Denyer accused Israel of “the worst blockade since the war began” and stressed “what is happening is a genocide.”
When, she asked, would the government “take measures under international law against ongoing genocide, illegal occupation and apartheid?”
No time soon was the response from Foreign Office minister Hamish Falconer.
Mourners gather around the bodies of 8 Red Crescent emergency responders, recovered in Rafah a week after an Israeli attack, as they are transported for burial from a hospital in Deir al-Balah, Gaza Strip, March 31, 2025
The massacre of Red Crescent and civil defence aid workers has elicited little coverage and no condemnation by major powers — this is the age of lawlessness, warns JOE GILL
IT IS difficult to be shocked after 18 months of Israel’s genocidal onslaught on Gaza.
Brazen crimes against humanity have become the norm. World powers do nothing in response. At best, they put out weak statements of concern. Now the US does not even bother with that. It is fully on board with genocide.
Israel and the US are planning the violent ethnic cleansing of Gaza, knowing full well that no-one will stop them. The International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court are sitting on their hands, despite what appeared to be significant rulings last year on Israeli war crimes by the ICC, and on the “plausible risk” of genocide by the ICJ.
As Israeli anti-zionist commentator Alon Mizrahi wrote this week:
“As Israel and the US announce and begin to enact plans to ethnically cleanse Gaza of Palestinians, let’s remember that the International Court of Justice has not even convened to discuss the genocide since May 24 2024, when it was using very blurry language about the planned Rafah action. Tens of thousands have been exterminated since then, and hundreds of thousands have been injured. Babies starved and froze to death, and thousands of children lost limbs. Not a word from the ICJ.
“Zionism and US imperialism have rendered international law null and void. Everyone is allowed to do as they please to anyone. The post-World War II masquerade is truly over.”
Under the Joe Biden administration, secretary of state Antony Blinken and the smirking US spokesperson Matt Miller would make performative statements about “concern” over the killing of Palestinians (they would never use a word as clear as “killing,” always preferring the perpetrator-free “deaths”).
Today, under the Donald Trump regime, the mask of respect for the rituals of international diplomacy has been thrown aside. This is the law of the jungle, and the winner is the government that uses superior force to seize what they believe is theirs, and to silence and destroy those who stand in their way.
