Team Green: The green test

Politicians will make claims as to their green credentials. Sadly there claims don't hold up to much scrutiny. Here's some food for thought. Cooking oil, after use can be filtered and cleaned up then used in diesel vehicles. We have a large number of restaurants and food outlets that throw away their oil, which is also problematic to cleanly dispose of. For a commercial organisation to arrange to collect, process and then sell this onto us is unviable because Mr Darling insists on the same level of fuel duty that applies to petroleum based diesel. By reducing the tax burden we can recycle an otherwise spent product, preserve oil, and help motorists. But think of the bigger picture; if the government were to organise collection and distribution it could create jobs and if the fuel were used to power public service vehicles the savings could lower our council tax bills. Not much effort but plenty of benefits. So why doesn't it happen? Politicians live in the pockets of the oil barons, and depend too much on the tax revenues oil brings. So if a politician claims to be green, the only I suppose they are... well Greenbacks anyhow.