The end of the world is nigh, again. And as usual, it’s being greeted largely with a shrug. Perhaps you felt a prick of unease as you scrolled the headlines, or half listened over breakfast to some radio debate about the fact that sometime in the next four years the planet is likely to breach the 1.5C rise in global temperature that we have long been told is the tipping point to avoid. (Although this time the breach should be only temporary, the World Meteorological Organisation report stresses that it still takes us into uncharted waters, and if nothing changes the world is likely to cross this dangerous threshold more and more often in future.)
Perhaps you even felt rage or frustration that it’s taking everyone else so long to wake up. But the chances are that most people will have forgotten it by lunchtime. YouGov’s regular tracker poll finds Britons are still more worried about immigration, which almost a third consider the single most important issue currently facing the country, than about climate and the environment.
