For decades, the government ignored increasing emissions from flying. They’ve now admitted that we need to tackle the damage planes do to the climate. But there’s a catch - the solutions proposed by airlines either don’t work, or won’t be around for decades at best. Meanwhile demand for air travel keeps on rising faster than technology improvements can keep up.
That’s why our director Leo came up with the frequent flyer levy - the fairest way to change the UK’s flying habits at the speed required.
Jump to: [What is a frequent flyer levy?] [How would it speed up action on climate change?] [Three ways to get involved].
What is a frequent flyer levy?
The problem
A small group of relatively wealthy frequent flyers take most of the flights and are responsible for most of the harm to the climate from flying. If they reduced their flying to the same level as the rest of us, that would tackle a big part of the problem of emissions from flying. Doing nothing isn’t an option: the government’s advisers on climate change have told them that overall levels of flying need to be managed for the UK to hit its climate targets. But if the government tries to reduce flights by increasing taxes by the same amount for everyone, that would make flying much more expensive for the majority of people who don’t fly very often, while having little impact on the wealthier frequent flyers causing most of the problem. We don’t think that would be fair.
Our solution
Right now, it doesn’t matter if you’re flying to visit your family for the first time in years, or taking your tenth holiday abroad of the year - you’ll pay the same tax for that flight. We think that’s as unfair and backwards as a flat tax on income would be. That’s why we’re proposing a frequent flyer levy, which would be the fairest way to tax flights and the most effective way to cut emissions.
Here’s how it works:
With a frequent flyer levy, the more someone flies in any given year, the more they pay. So, for example, someone taking their fourth flight of the year would pay a higher tax on that flight than someone on the same plane who hasn't yet flown that year. Think of it like income tax, which increases progressively so that people earning a lot pay tax at a higher rate than people who don’t earn much.
A frequent flyer levy would cut air travel without making flights more expensive for most of us, who don’t fly often
Cash from taxing frequent flyers could support airline workers into careers fit for a climate-friendly future or be invested in low carbon travel like international rail routes.
How would a frequent flyer levy speed up action on climate change?
Getting on a plane is the only way to emit tonnes of climate-crashing greenhouse gases in just a few hours. Collectively, we all need to fly less and choose ways of travelling which are better for the climate. But some people are flying a lot more than the rest of us and causing most of the environmental damage. Did you know that just 15% of people who fly frequently take 70% of all UK flights? While more than half the UK population don’t fly at all in any given year?!
We need to act fast to slow down climate change, which means sensible policies to encourage sustainable lifestyles. Unfortunately, technological solutions to allow us to fly without emitting a lot of greenhouse gases won’t be available quickly enough to solve this problem. This means we need ways to encourage people to fly less often - particularly in countries like Britain, whose citizens already take more flights abroad than the people of any other country in the world.
The only way we can keep overall levels of flying within safe limits, but still maintain access to some air travel for people with lower levels of disposable income, is to introduce a frequent flyer levy.
Three ways you can support our frequent flyer levy campaign:
Write to your MP
To win this policy change and tackle pollution from flying, we need to get MPs on board. To do this, we need to make them realise that their constituents, as well as people across the UK, want flights to be reduced in a way that’s fair. That’s why we’ll be doing all we can to raise this in Parliament, and pushing the government to follow the assembly’s recommendation.
We’ve made it quick and easy to tell your MP that you’d support a frequent flyer levy. Type in your name and postcode into our online tool, and a template email will pop-up for your local MP which you can personalise or simply hit ‘SEND’.
2. Get people talking
With more and more people across the UK realising that we’re facing a climate emergency, it’s vital that they know about the solutions too. Will you start the conversation about bringing in the frequent flyer levy with your friends, family or colleagues?
We’ve created shareable graphics to get you started, but if you encounter some tricky questions you’d like a hand with, see our FAQ page or just email Hannah at hannah@wearepossible.org. She’d be happy to help.
*Don’t forget to tag us in any social media posts. For Facebook, use @wearepossibleuk. for Instagram or Twitter we’re at @_wearepossible.
3. Donate
To tackle the climate crisis, we have to make bold changes to everyday life. And that means creating solutions that work for communities, and doing everything we can to get decision makers to implement them. By campaigning for the frequent flyer levy, Possible is speeding up the transition to a cleaner fairer UK.
