Imagine this: You are on a cruise ship with your children and grandchildren. You are having a wonderful time sitting on the deck enjoying the scenery drinking a glass of wine (or another favourite beverage.)

You notice in the distance what looks like an iceberg. You mention it to another passenger. She replies “Don’t worry ... if it is serious the captain will change course before it gets near.” You decide not to worry and enjoy your drink.

A few hours later you notice that the iceberg has got closer and the captain hasn't changed course. Now you start to worry. You speak to a few passengers about it. But they all think that you are a worrywart, that the captain has everything under control so just sit back and enjoy the cruise.

Still you are not convinced so you speak to a member of the crew. And she says that the captain is very experienced and if she hasn’t changed course then there is nothing to worry about. Anyway the cruise ship is one of the best and has never hit an iceberg before. It has all of the best iceberg detector computers and even if the captain doesn’t change course the computer will change course before an accident happens.

Some more time passes and the iceberg is still getting closer and the ship is still sailing directly towards it. Now you are becoming alarmed and talk to the crew again. Still no change.

So you talk to some of the other passengers. And they still aren’t worried. They tell you to shut up and enjoy the cruise. You get your family members to put on their lifejackets but no one else does. You try to get the crew to get ready to launch the lifeboats but they still tell you that there is nothing to fear.

You go up to see the captain and point out the iceberg which is directly in the path. The captain is indignant and replies “Do you think I don’t know what I am doing? do you think I am stupid? I can see the iceberg. I’m not blind. But if I change course now it will take us longer to get to port and time is money.” You tell him that if the cruise ship crashes into the iceberg then a lot  more will be lost than money. The entire ship, crew and passengers.

The captain says that this is a possibility but perhaps we will be lucky and miss the iceberg or the iceberg will move out of the way. He understands that if the cruise ship does hit the iceberg that the ship might sink and that most of the passengers will drown but he can’t tell the passengers to put on their lifejackets because that would scare them and they are on a holiday of a lifetime and he wouldn’t want to spoil that.

What would you do? Would you run around the ship yelling at the passengers that the ship is going to hit the iceberg, that the captain refuses to change course and that they ought to gang up on the captain and force her to change course. And if she still refused to do that they ought to take control of the ship and change course immediately. Perhaps if they did that you might miss the iceberg or you might hit it but just a glancing blow so that there would be a little damage but the ship wouldn’t sink. Would you tell them that even if they don’t care about themselves they should be worried for their grandchildren. Would you be angry if still nothing happened?

(This is why I am angry with our politicians’ inaction on climate change. They know what the problem is, they know that they have very little time to change course, they promise to change course but then they do nothing on the grounds that they don’t want to anger their voters.)