The private jet sector has boomed since the start of the pandemic, reveals a report from the progressive think tank Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) and nonpartisan organisation Patriotic Millionaires. While there was a drop in private flights in 2020, the sector picked up quickly again and saw an unprecedented number of 5.3 million business jet operations in 2022.
Compared to 2019, the number of flights globally and in the US increased by around a fifth last year. A 2022 study found that because of the increased flights, private jet emissions have increased by 23%. In the last two decades, the global private jet fleet size increased 133% – from 9,895 in 2000 to 23,122 in mid-2022.
Private jet travel is reserved for the few. The typical private jet owner has a net worth of $190m, according to the report. Since private jets emit at least ten times more than commercial planes per passenger, these ultra-rich private flyers are causing a disproportionate amount of emissions.
Awareness about the environmental costs of private jets has been increasing, putting frequent flyers under scrutiny. Celebrity Kylie Jenner made headlines last summer when she used her private jet for a short hop of just 17 minutes, a trip that would have taken less than an hour by car. A Twitter account tracking private jet flights of celebrities – since suspended, together with a similar account tracking Elon Musk’s flights – showed that this trip was far from unusual for the rich and famous.
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Category: politics
Ultra-rich private jet travel has soared since the pandemic – and emissions followed
The impact of the filthy rich and their private jets
Vid also exposes rich Davosians and the Murdoch family as climate destroying high users of private jets.
My ticket to the London event seems to be delayed in the post ;)
Keir Starmer Now Opposes Scrapping Westminster’s Voting System for PR in Blow for Reformers
His spokesperson told Byline Times that the Labour Leader has a “long-standing view against PR”
Labour Leader Keir Starmer actively opposes a move to proportional representation for the House of Commons – putting him at loggerheads with the party membership and trade unions, Byline Times can reveal.
On Wednesday, this newspaper reported that the 350,000-strong union USDAW had become the latest to call on Labour to back scrapping Westminster’s winner-takes-all voting system, First Past the Post.
Two-thirds of trade unions that support the Labour Party now back a major change to Westminster’s voting system amid a mounting campaign among the party and union grassroots.
But Starmer’s official spokesperson has now revealed that the Labour Leader has a “long-standing view against proportional representation”. When asked to clarify if the Labour leader was against PR he said “yes”.
“He isn’t looking to change the electoral system…It’s not something that’s a priority for him,” Starmer’s spokesperson added.
Labour delegates overwhelmingly backed PR at last year’s party conference – after mega-unions Unison and Unite supported the shift. But they do not control the manifesto – a process that is steered by the Labour Leader and his allies on the National Executive Committee.
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Labour ‘betrays millions of young people’ after dropping pledge to abolish university tuition fees
STUDENTS and education unions slammed Labour’s “betrayal of millions of young people in desperate need of hope” today after the party’s increasingly right-wing leadership dropped a pledge to abolish cripplingly high university tuition fees.
Sir Keir Starmer’s latest U-turn on yet another left-wing pledge which got him elected leader in 2020 will help to condemn “millions of future students to a life of debt” and leaves Britain even further away from the publicly funded higher education system it needs, they stressed.
The move is likely to draw criticism from the party’s left, which has repeatedly warned that attempts to please the right-wing press while failing to offer a genuinely progressive alternative will only benefit Tory Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.
With Tory MPs branding Jeremy Corbyn’s successor “Sir Flip-Flop,” Mr Sunak attempted to capitalise on the situation in a fiery Prime Ministers Questions today saying Sir Keir has made a “series of broken promises.”
These include now abandoned pledges to renationalise public services, increase income tax for the highest earners and defend freedom of movement post-Brexit.
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