Debates

Debate: Higher Taxes on Low-Cost Flights?

By Ben West ⋅ November 20, 2007 ⋅  Print this post ⋅ Post a comment ⋅ Share on Facebook

Welcome to Debate of the Week (anyone that can come up with a better name wins a prize), where each week we’ll be taking you through key questions in climate change, giving you both sides of the argument, linking you to all the information, and then letting you make up your own mind.This week, we’re looking at flying. Most sane people now realise that we need to cut our carbon emissions by between 50-80%, the question is, how. One cause of CO₂ , as we know, is flying. Although aeroplanes still remain quite a small part of our overall carbon emissions, over the past few years the number of flights we take have been rising rediculously quickly.

This is thanks to the arrival of new, low-cost airlines such as Easyjet and Ryanair, which allow people to fly to Spain for £20, or go to Rome for the weekend. These low prices mean that thousands of people who previously couldn’t, can now afford to fly. And of course, more people flying, means more flights, which means more carbon.

So what do we do about it? Well, one idea is to raise taxes on these low-cost flights, making them more expensive causing, people hope, less people to fly, meaning less flights. Is this a good idea? Read on for both sides of the debate…