THE environment is our means of survival.

How do we treat it? We pollute and exploit it. We poison the fields, the animals and ourselves with chemicals, we choke the roads with vehicles which choke us.

We throw away much of what we buy, because of useless packaging, which is all about advertising and profit, rather than about product quality and sustainability or best use of natural resources.

What is the result? Worcestershire County Council wanted an incinerator to deal with the waste of two counties and beyond.

I am not a global doom-monger, just a socialist urging the county to implement its own waste plan and begin recycling its waste right now, and for it to offer a radical public transport system, to save fuel and lives.

NIGEL KNOWLES

Ex-chairman, Worcestershire County Council and its planning committee,

Welch Gate

Bewdley