The
chancellor, George Osborne, who has ended his statement,
froze public sector pay, slashed welfare benefits and
increased taxes (including VAT to 20% from January 2011).
He
said his 'tough but fair' Budget was 'unavoidable' although
he told MPs in the Commons there would be no extra tax
on alcohol, tobacco and fuel. Child benefit will be frozen
for three years and there would be cuts to family tax
credits and housing benefits. And there will be a two
year pay freeze for public servants paid over £21,000
reports the BBC.
Mr
Osborne said Britain's record budget deficit would be
eliminated within five years - faster than the previous
Labour government was planning. He said such action was
needed to prevent a 'catastrophic collapse' in economic
confidence but he stressed it would be done in a 'fair'
way with the better-off shouldering most of the burden.
'Everyone will pay something but the people at the bottom
of the income scale will pay proportionately less than
those at the top. This is a progressive Budget,' he said
to jeers from Labour MPs.
Housing
benefit will be reformed with a maximum limit of £400
a week, in a package saving £1.8bn a year by the
end of the Parliament. Other benefits to be cut include
the health in pregnancy grant while the Sure Start maternity
grant will be restricted to the first child only and lone
parents will be expected to look for work when their youngest
child goes to school. But there will be an extra £150
a year for the poorest families, through changes to family
tax credits to ensure, Mr Osborne said, child poverty
reduction targets would be met. The government is also
to introduce a medical assessment for Disability Living
Allowance from 2013 for new and existing claimants.
Mr
Osborne said the state now accounted for 'almost half' of
all national income which was 'completely unsustainable'.
He
added 'current expenditure would rise from £637bn
in 2010-11 to £711bn
in 2015-16, blaming a 'rapidly rising bill for debt interest'.
He
said compared with the plans set out by Labour, the government
would cut additional current expenditure by £30bn
a year by 2014-15. There would be no further reductions
in capital spending totals in this Budget but 'careful choices'
would be made about how it was spent. Projects with 'a significant
economic return to the country' would be prioritised - assessed
in the autumn spending review.
The
Labour Party argue that rather than being a necessary response
to Britain's massive debts, Mr Osborne's emergency Budget
is an ideologically driven assault on public spending which
risks pushing the UK back into recession. Read
more at BBC News
Environment
- With
all but a token gesture to environmental concerns in the
budget, the government said it will
'explore changes to the aviation tax system' such as switching
from a per-passenger to a per-plane levy. It will consult
on major changes. This comes as little surprise from a
government with no 'real' environmental agenda and will.
*
If you cannot open the .pdf documents above then
you can download Adobe's latest Acrobat Reader for
free here.
Internet
Search Engines earn money from clicks on the sponsored links,
which are displayed next to the generic search results.
Each click on one of these sponsored links generates a few
cents of revenue for for them.
According
to Ecosia - the independently owned organisation partnered
by Bing, Yahoo and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF),
'about two percent of the search requests end up with a
click on a sponsored link. The exact amount we earn depends
a lot on the country. Searches from the United States generated
a lot more revenue than searches in markets with less developed
online advertising markets like India or Brazil. On international
average we currently earn 0.13 Euro Cent per search.'
Ecosia,
the eco-friendly search engine go on to say - 'we donate
at least 80 percent of this money to a rainforest protection
project run by the WWF. The
project is located in the Juruena national park. It costs
only 5 Euros to protect an entire hectare of rainforest
there. So based on our average earnings per search, we can
save about two square meters for each search you do.'
'Saving
about two square meters of rainforest per search prevents
many tons of CO2 emissions. In comparison to that the impact
of green servers is minimal. They only prevent about 2 grams
of CO2 emission per search.
Ecosia
is available in over 30 countries. Click here
to select your country and give them a try.
Click
the screen above to see how Ecosia, the Eco-friendly Search
Engine works or click on the following link to get
a brief idea on 'how
it works in 60 seconds'.
Think
Before You Print
Please
consider the environment before printing this email.
Maybe
you have seen this message on many emails before, so here's
why! Think
Before Printing is a global campaign to reduce wasteful
printing and thus save more trees from being logged. They
don't want to stop you printing, but simply think that sometimes,
people, and not everyone, need reminding that wasting paper,
ink and toner doesn't make economic or environmental sense.
Their
message isn't limited to emails. Every day, people hit the
print button without really considering why. Often it's
because we're used to seeing things on paper and we have
some irrational desire to hoard information 'so we've got
it to hand', but so often this spontaneous compulsion to
print is unnecessary. Indeed, thinkbeforeprinting.org estimate
that over 50% of pages printed are never looked at! Consider
how many times an almost completely blank 'page 2 of 2'
comes out of your printer when printing emails and documents.
So if you would like to join in the campaign to spread the
word and help people to stop and 'think' before they print,
visit www.thinkbeforeprinting.org
and hopefully we can all save a few more trees!
Greener
Shopping
MoreEco
is the UK's only Eco Cash Back website. They list over 100
organic, green and ethical online retailers and have negotiated
with them a Cash Back percentage which is passed on to you.
You choose your shop, click through, start shopping and
in 30 days you will receive a percentage of what you spent
in your MoreEco account. Just go to www.moreeco.co.uk
for more details.
Say
No To Phone Books
Apparently,
'more than 75 million are delivered to UK homes each year
but a campaign began recently to slash this figure to cut
waste. Online directory service 192.com
and the independent environmental charity Global
Action Plan want us to opt in to get a new directory.'
Read more at www.saynotophonebooks.org
and decide for yourself.
How
Much Do You Waste?
Each
and every day, every single one of us makes an impact or
'footprint' on our planet and its resources. It is now common
thinking that as the planet's population of nearly 7 billion
rises, these resources will become more and more strained
- and as the laws of 'supply and demand' go, prices generally
rise too. This is why I believe we should all take stock
and make an individual effort to reduce our own footprints,
or it could cost us all dearly. So why not take the carbon
test and have your carbon footprint estimated and find out
how you can reduce your own footprint on our planet. Here
are some personally recommended carbon footprint calculators
to try:
For
businesses, you can find useful information on saving energy
costs at the UK's Carbon
Trust website.
Have
Your Say
If
you are concerned about how much we waste in our society,
you might like to learn more about the Scottish
Government's development of their Zero Waste Plan for
Scotland which outlines how we can all play our part in
reducing the amount of waste we produce, reuse valuable
resources and increase recycling levels to help Scotland
become a Zero Waste Society. You can have your say and give
input to their Consultation
which closes on 13th November 2009. So you'd better hurry!
Eco
Grants - Are You Entitled?
According
to the Home
Heating Guide, research undertaken by the New Policy
Institute (NPI), an independent think-tank, has uncovered
an alarming truth relating to trends in domestic energy
bill savings in the UK. According to the 'Missing Millions'
research, up to 3.6 million domestic energy consumers are
missing out on potential savings because they are neglecting
to claim for insulation grants.
The
Energy Saving Trust Scotland provides energy saving advice
for the general public. It runs regional centres and provides
advice on saving energy in the home online or on their Energy
Efficiency Hotline. There may be grants and offers to help
you save energy and improve your home's running costs at
the Energy Saving Trust's UK
and Scotland
sites.
The
Energy Saving Trust also run a programme called Green Communities
that aims to support, facilitate and promote community based
energy projects. From free training and advice focused on
project planning and funding, to technical support and a
website packed with resources - Green
Communities exisits to help you make a success of your
ideas and projects.
UK
Boiler Scrappage Scheme Unveiled by the Chancellor
A
scrappage scheme that will pay people £400 to replace
old boilers with new ones has been announced in Chancellor
Alistair Darling's pre-budget
report. 'Each inefficient boiler adds over £200
to household bills and one tonne of carbon to the atmosphere,'
he said. From April [2010], some £200m would be added
to help with energy efficiency to cut carbon emissions from
homes, he said.
'As
well as investing in clean and low-carbon technologies,
we must become more energy efficient, to cut emissions as
well as household bills,' Mr Darling said. 'A quarter of
all the country's emissions come from households.'
The
Seasonal Efficiency of Domestic Boilers in the UK (or SEDBUK
Rating) rating scheme was developed in conjunction with
boiler manufacturers and the UK Government and provides
a fair comparison of average boiler efficiency. A clear
rating system is now applied to all boilers from A-G, A
being the best and most efficient. If you want to find out
how efficient your
boiler is try their boiler efficiency lookup.
Olny
srmat poelpe can raed this. I cdnuolt blveiee that I cluod
aulaclty uesdnatnrd what I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor
of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde
Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in what oredr the ltteers
in a word are, the olny iprmoatnt tihng is that the first
and last ltteer be in the rghit pclae. The rset can be a
taotl mses and you can still raed it wouthit a porbelm.
This is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter
by istlef, but the word as a wlohe. Amzanig huh? Yaeh and
I awlyas tghuhot slpeling was ipmorantt! If you can raed
this psas it on!!
Tech
Talk...
Webmasters,
Advertisers and Press
Our
plan is to expand the features and information on this site
so if you wish to promote your eco business, have media
you wish to feed into the site or wish to talk to us for
your own media articles then email
me with your request.
Your
Feedback and Ideas
If
there is any information you would like us to display or
know of any websites with appropriate content we could highlight,
please contact us and we will
give it our serious consideration. Thank you.
Find
Us On:
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Big Eco Directory features all of the best eco-friendly
and green related websites on the web. If you want to be
listed, it's completely free!'
'Welcome
to the best FREE! small business directory in the UK. Built
and maintained by SEO specialists registration is Free and
advertising is FREE Every listing is manually approved by
our moderators to ensure that the CarbonONE Business Directory
remains clean and professional.'
Talking
Green
If
you like to discuss ethical and environmental issues or
simply have a question to pose, why not 'become a fan' of
'my ethical ifa' blog on Facebook and start debating. Just
click on the link and follow the instructions. Facebook
Link to Follow.
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