Something very worrying has been going on at Scotland Yard. We now know that in dealing with the phone-hacking affair at the 'News of the World,' they cut short their original inquiry; suppressed evidence; misled the public and the press; concealed information and broke the law. Why?

The friends of tabloid newspapers often point out that their journalism exists only because millions of people pay money to read it.

The Murdoch-owned 'Sunday Times' has an appalling history of involvement in illegal activity. And it's because they're Sunday papers; they're trying to get scoops that the dailies haven't got.

It's the tabloids, with their intense commercial need to get scoops to bring in readers, that run a regime of fear, where reporters are bullied, shouted at. That's where things go wrong.

We might be more inclined to think about the longer term if we were more aware of what is happening around us. Perhaps daily weather forecasts could include a few basic facts about the Earth's vital signs or details of where climate change is increasing the likelihood of damaging weather?

Shifting towards low-carbon energy systems can avert climate catastrophe while creating new opportunities for investment, growth, and employment.

Some types of environmental restoration projects are well-known; restored wetlands, for instance, or coal mine reclamation projects. Recently though, larger dam removal projects have started, a number of them in Washington state.

Climates always change. The question is, how are we going to adapt to climate change? Now, it may be true that we are accelerating it inadvertently by messing with our atmosphere, but regardless of that, the climate will change.