Get a mortgage and kill a baby polar bear — free!
Spotted on a poster on the way to work today: LloydsTSB have an exciting and unique offer in which you can take out a mortgage with them and they will kill a baby polar bear on your behalf.
Okay, that’s not true. But they do have “The only mortgage that gives you free Airmiles”, which means that they are encouraging you to increase our global warming, and thus destroy the habitat (and lives) of polar bears. And, ultimately, ourselves.
Not surprisingly, the bank does have an environmental policy, and it’s instructive reading for anyone formulating a similar policy of their own. Quite rightly, they recognise that
Banks have a direct impact on the environment and can affect it indirectly through the actions of their borrowers. [...] Effective environmental management reduces business risks, cuts costs and improves our efficiency.
But when it comes to hard commitments they say:
We commit to reduce our total carbon emissions by 30% by 2012, and then offset our remaining emissions.
Which is sounds good, but their commitment is to reduce their own carbon emissions, and says nothing about reducing it globally or encouraging similar behaviour in others. So their anti-environmental Airmiles mortgage manages to be consistent with their environment policy.
The best possible interpretation of all this is that LloydsTSB is having trouble getting commitment at all levels for the spirit of their positive environmental stance. The worst possible interpretation is that their environmental policy is little more than a tick-box exercise. Either way, it’s terribly sad.
