The Manila Times features Depot on France banning short flights: ‘This is what a climate lockdown looks like. This is what the Great Reset looks like’

https://www.msn.com/en-ph/travel/news/climate-lockdowns-begin-france-bans-short-haul-flights-to-fight-climate-change/ar-AA1cF0K7

Climate lockdowns begin; France bans short-haul flights to fight climate change

by Yen Makabenta

MARC Morano, founder of the Climate Depot website, first warned of the danger of travel bans in his book Green Fraud in 2021. He wrote:

“The climate alarmists and activists were first of all jealous when the Covid lockdowns happened at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. They were beside themselves, saying, ‘How is this happening?’ Everyone from Greta Thunberg to John Kerry, and UN officials. And then they started saying, ‘We need to follow this. If we can shut down for a virus, we can shut down for the climate.’ And that’s what we’re seeing now. There are even academics in Australia proposing adding climate change to death certificates. And Bill Gates has said the death toll will be greater than the pandemic. So they’re following every step of the way, and it’s not just, you know, a professor here, or someone in academia. We have a major UK report coming out, as well as an international agency report that will call for essentially the same type of lockdowns — everything from restrictions on your thermostat to restrictions [on] moving. You can only fly in a climate emergency, one that’s ‘morally justifiable.’ You know, kinda like a lockdown, you have to justify going to the store for essential services.”

‘Symbolic bans’

Morano’s apprehension has started to happen.

Starting on the first of June, France has banned domestic short-haul flights where train alternatives exist, in a bid to cut carbon emissions.

The law came into force two years after lawmakers had voted to end routes where the same journey could be made by train in under two-and-a-half hours.

The ban all but rules out air travel between Paris and cities including Nantes, Lyon and Bordeaux, while connecting flights are unaffected.

Critics have described the latest measures as “symbolic bans.”

Laurent Donceel, interim head of industry group Airlines for Europe (A4E), told the AFP news agency that “banning these trips will only have minimal effects” on CO2 output. Governments should instead support “real and significant solutions” to the issue, he said.

Airlines around the world have been severely hit by the coronavirus pandemic, with the website Flightradar24 reporting that the number of flights last year was down almost 42 percent from 2019.

The French government had faced calls to introduce even stricter rules.

France’s Citizens’ Convention on Climate, which was created by President Emmanuel Macron in 2019 and included 150 members of the public, had proposed scrapping plane journeys where train journeys of under four hours existed.

Marc Morano commented on banning short airline flights: “This is what a climate lockdown looks like. This is what the Great Reset looks like. The climate agenda demands you give up airline travel, car travel, cheap reliable energy, and plentiful food. Net Zero goals are now dictating vehicle shortages to force more people into mass transit.

“They’re going after your freedom of movement. They’re going after private car ownership. They’re going after everything it means to be a free person and turning it over to the administrative state.”

French consumer group UFC-Que Choisir had earlier called on lawmakers to retain the four-hour limit.

“On average, the plane emits 77 times more CO2 per passenger than the train on these routes, even though the train is cheaper and the time lost is limited to 40 minutes,” it said.

It also called for “safeguards that [French national railway] SNCF will not seize the opportunity to artificially inflate its prices or degrade the quality of rail service.”

The law will mostly rule out air trips between Paris Orly airport and regional hubs such as Nantes, Lyon and Bordeaux.

Critics have noted that the cutoff point is shy of the roughly three hours it takes to travel from Paris to the Mediterranean port city of Marseille by high-speed rail.

As rail services improve, more routes could be added such as those between Paris Charles de Gaulle and Lyon and Rennes as well as journeys between Lyon and Marseille. They currently don’t meet the criteria for the ban because trains to airports in Paris and Lyon don’t allow passengers to arrive early in the morning or late in the evening.

Connecting flights are unaffected by the new law.

Train services must meet certain conditions to replace flights. The new law specifies that train services on the same route must be frequent, timely and well-connected enough to meet the needs of passengers who would otherwise travel by air — and able to absorb the increase in passenger numbers.

In October 2021, Greenpeace demanded an EU-wide ban on any flights where the rail journey would take under six hours…. Germany also has short-haul flights in its sights. While not banning or cutting back on them, the German government recently doubled the amount of tax levied on short flight tickets. Spain, meanwhile, has said it wants to eliminate all short-haul flights by 2050…. Austria has taken a similar tack: when the government bailed out Austrian Airlines during the pandemic, the carrier was ordered to stop operating its Vienna-Salzburg route so that customers could prioritize train travel instead.

France’s Minister of Transportation Clement Beaune admits intending to spread the ban beyond France’s borders. In an interview with Le Parisien, he said “that the EU must act as one on this matter to ensure that all have the same rules and impact is maximized.” He also announced plans to promote the agenda at October’s meeting of European transportation ministers….

The UN-approved book “Agenda 21: The Earth Summit Strategy to Save Our Planet,” explained that “effective execution of Agenda 21 will require a profound reorientation of all human society, unlike anything the world has ever experienced.”

Morano wrote: “The turn toward climate lockdowns epitomizes the irrationality, silliness and self-absorption of the climate crusade. It shows that it really knows no bounds…

“You can only fly in a climate emergency, one that’s ‘morally justifiable.’ You know, kinda like a lockdown, you have to justify going to the store for essential services. They’re going after freedom of movement. They’re going after private car ownership. They’re going after everything it means to be a free person and turning it over to the administrative state.”

What will BBM bring back from Dubai?

When the climate summit takes place in Dubai in November, climate lockdowns will almost surely be on the table for discussion. President Marcos Jr. has eagerly accepted an invitation to attend the conference, confirming yet again his inability to resist an opportunity to travel abroad at public expense.

Let’s pray that when he returns home, his pasalubong is not a sweeping ban on short-haul flights. Should this be his surprise, the ban should include a restriction on his own foreign travels.

Fair is fair.

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