this was just going to be a Facebook post but I got too worked up!
Tesco Low-Energy light bulbs
What happened to low-energy bulbs (the ones with the curly tubes)? I was in Tesco (yes, let’s name names) and I needed a bulb cos my hallway 40w has blown and its too dark – no window. So I go to the shelf with 50 types of bulb and there are 2 single 100w low-energy bulbs! Anyway, frustrated, I go to the counter with a pack of 2 40w bayonet, old style bulbs and they don’t scan! I am at the head of a big queue but luckily the shelf is only 20 feet away.
“You have to buy another. We can’t sell you this!” the cashier says.
“But it’s Tesco’s own brand!” I counter.
“Can’t sell it to you!”
I run to the shelf and an assistant comes to help. He can’t find any other 40w bayonet bulbs so have to give up. I go back to pay for the rest of my shopping and ask:
“Why don’t you stock low-energy bulbs any more?”
“We did once. Then we stopped.”
Great!
So not only doesn’t Tesco stock low-energy bulbs any more but Tesco is stocking its own brand bulbs which it can’t sell? How surreal is that?
Tesco Carrier Bags
It’s almost as crazy as the plastic carrier bag fiasco. Most supermarkets stopped doing carrier bags for a few weeks. You had to buy a tough, canvas reusable one for about £2 (or a cheap plastic reusable one for £1) and carry it with you to work (if you worked) and then all the way back to the supermarket when you shopped on the way home. It was a pain. Then I noticed that they were starting to give people the £1 plastic reusable bags because people had no bags and no money for the reusable bags and supermarkets who didn’t have plastic bags where haemhoraging customers. So about two weeks after this they start doing the disposable plastic bags again. I guess they admitted defeat on the environmental issue.
I feel sorry for the poor inhabitants of that island in the Caribbean where all the carrier bags and plastic garbage from around the world washes up. Did anybody tell them we have given up on recycling and environmentally friendly policies?
Car Pollution
On the way back from the supermarket about 12 noon today) I passed Balfour Beatty roadworks on Tottenham High Road just outside the Town Hall. I had noticed a a Balfour Beatty diesel Vauxhall Astra with its driver sitting in it and the engine ticking over on my way to the supermarket. When I returned it was still ticking over, he was still in it, and all the time, 1 hour, he had the driver window wound all the way down. It’s not particularly cold today so why did he have to have the engine generating heat just so he could sit there with his window open talking on his mobile – for 1 hour!
Wasteful
I didn’t take his number plate, but Mister, you know who you are!
Five minutes later I came to another building site (Loughman) – right outside Tottenham Arts Centre. I had passed a digger that was sitting empty. I had seen it being operated on the way to Tesco with about half a dozen men around it. I guess they had gone for a tea break or to lunch but the men were nowhere to be seen. And the engine was still ticking over (don’t know if petrol or diesel)!
Wasteful.
Again you know who you are.
If you are from Balfour Beatty or Loughman I would love to hear from you, especially if you are the drivers of those two vehicles. You can defend yourselves here.
Continuing on my theme: I mean, I know it’s obvious that the Conservative Government has given up on reusable energy. What is it Dave Cameron said off-camera to another MP, “Enough of that environmental shit!”
But when did the public and retailers give up? When did we all give up?
Am I wrong, or are we seeing the first signs of a kind of fatalism creeping in about recycling and environmentally friendly policies?
What is your view? if these stories make you angry and you feel anything at all, have your say by leaving a comment.
Lazlo Ferran | Vampire, Werewolf and Sci-fi Books 