Vote Blue, Go Green: Air Ashcroft

Following on the heels of out-of-town supermarket parking and rejecting pay-as-you-throw, it's yet another example of why you can't trust the Tories on the environment.

Shadow cabinet ministers and aides have flown 184,000 miles on the Ashcroft jet over the last five years with Andrew Mitchell, the shadow international development secretary, flying 65,453 miles and shadow foreign secretary William Hague flying 49,670 miles. [David Cameron] has flown just over 3,700 miles on the Ashcroft jet ... [but] Cameron's carbon footprint is much higher if another 68 internal flights, including a short helicopter ride from Birmingham to Warwick, are taken into account.

Analysis conducted for the Guardian reveals that Tory globetrotting has racked up 1,289 tonnes of carbon emissions ... [Michael Ashcroft's] Falcon burns about 3,000 US gallons of fuel to cover its maximum range of 4-5,000 miles. A Boeing 777 uses about 30,000 US gallons to cover the same distance. But the Boeing can carry 300 people, which significantly reduces its carbon footprint per passenger kilometre, the usual yardstick for emissions. If the Falcon flew with three passengers, then each would be responsible for 10 times as much pollution as those in the Boeing.