I DOUBT that there are many people that do not have some sense of responsibility towards protecting the environment. Whether or not you believe that climate change is being caused by the deeds and misdeeds of mankind, you must surely accept that it makes sense to avoid damaging the environment if possible.

So, when I came to buy a new car eight years ago I opted for one with a diesel engine. I listened to the ‘experts’, politicians and bureaucrats locally, in Westminster and in Brussels that were telling us that diesel engines were less harmful to the environment than those burning petrol.

Now, we are told that this advice has been turned on its head and I am a ‘bad boy’ for driving a diesel-powered car. To punish offenders like me, proposals are said to be being actively considered to increase tax on diesels. A suggestion that a scrappage scheme should be introduced to encourage drivers like me to part early with our diesel-powered cars has apparently been quickly rejected at Westminster.

This debacle over diesel emissions is to my mind just the latest in an ever increasing list of blunders by the politicians, civil servants and scientists that are making the policy on how we should be protecting the environment. These no doubt sincere and well-meaning folks are getting it wrong so often that my trust in them is ebbing fast.

At the very same time that I was learning about the ‘greenies’ wanting to remove diesel engines from our communities, I read that the supermarket chain, Sainsbury’s, is lashing out a lot of cash on installing diesel generators at their stores. This is apparently the company’s reaction to having studied carefully how the Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC) is managing our electricity supply and evidently they simply do not trust this government to keep the lights on during this coming and subsequent winters.

Then we have the recent case of Wiltshire Council granting planning permission for ten large diesel generators to be installed at a solar farm at Broughton Gifford. I am branded as ‘naughty’ for having a diesel car but the solar farm owner can install a large number of these noisy and polluting diesel generators because the penny has finally dropped that the sun only shines for a few hours a day and demand for electricity happens around the clock.

Solar power has benefited from billions of pounds of taxpayers' money being poured into it in recent years which make it twice as expensive as fossil fuels. Yet, despite the generous subsidies, solar power contributes only 1.2 per cent of the UK’s electricity.

It wasn’t long ago that wind farms were very much in favour with our government too but just recently someone took a rational look at the situation and announced that research shows that wind farms are simply not economically viable in England because we don’t have enough windy days. What a pity that research wasn’t done before so much taxpayers money was paid out in subsidies.

If those charged with the responsibility of making policy on environmental protection, whether they be in Brussels or Westminster, want to salvage some credibility in my eyes, they need to start getting their act together.

There have been too many blunders, contradictions and U-turns relating to environmental protection and ‘clean’ energy. This has left me somewhat dispirited and angry. It seems to me that if you did the opposite to the advice coming from the policy makers you would be more often proved right than wrong.