When people say they support something to pollsters its often difficult to capture their depth of support. Most people would say they like chocolate ice cream but asked if they would be willing to forfeit $100 for a chocolate ice cream cone would pass on the ice cream.

On paper most people would like something to be done about climate change. But their depth of support is equally shallow as is there support for chocolate ice cream. It sounds nice to protect the planet for future generations, to avoid the severe damage to infrastructure and our homes and businesses that increased severe weather is to impose on them.

People like climate change action if it’s free to them and has no impact on how they live their lives. Slap a few solar panels on your roof, scrub your plastic bottles before tossing them in the blue bin, drive your Prisus to Wally World. But not so much if it means much higher energy bills, less reliable electricity, more restrictions on driving, less low cost products at the store and fewer jobs.

I think many on the left are correct to diagnose climate change as a serious problem. But they are quite happy to live as life of fiction, pretending that the solutions are zero cost – or just a big bill they can dump on the rich.