Our Great Loss

It would be naïve as well as churlish to deny that Britain has suffered a significant loss today, which we can only hope will occasion a suitable period of national self-reflection: Much to the grief of all decent and right-thinking people, Greta Thunberg has declined to attend the Glasgow climate summit in November. With exemplary diplomatic tact, she gave as her reason the unevenness of Covid-19 vaccine distribution, which will prevent poorer countries from participating on equitable terms. A suitably unsophisticated observer, such as (to take a purely random example) some loutish Regency throwback now weighing up his chances of becoming the next consort to Her Widowed Madge Gawblesser, might almost believe that the risk of a Bozza's Britain Saves the World rah-and-blah had never crossed Thunberg's mind.