Add your voice
Let's tax the most polluting luxury travel
- The private jets and superyachts of the super-rich are some of the most polluting ways to travel, yet they are not taxed fairly
- Urgent action is needed to tackle the climate crisis. Those who pollute the most - and who can afford it the most – must pay the most
- Sign the open letter to call on the UK Chancellor and Scotland’s Cabinet Secretary for Finance to use the powers they each hold to help raise significant new money for climate justice, beginning with fairer taxation of luxury transport.
Let's tax the most polluting luxury travel
- The private jets and superyachts of the super-rich are some of the most polluting ways to travel, yet they are not taxed fairly
- Urgent action is needed to tackle the climate crisis. Those who pollute the most - and who can afford it the most – must pay the most
- Sign the open letter to call on the UK Chancellor and Scotland’s Cabinet Secretary for Finance to use the powers they each hold to help raise significant new money for climate justice, beginning with fairer taxation of luxury transport.
There’s enough money to go around but it requires making fairer choices. Across the UK, fair taxes on the use of private jets and superyachts could raise up to £2 billion a year for climate action and incentivise those who use them to stop. The UK and Scottish Governments have the responsibility and the opportunity to use the powers they each hold to take the bold action needed to tackle climate inequality and create a fairer, more sustainable future for everyone.
Join us in calling for urgent action and we’ll deliver your message to the UK Chancellor and Scotland’s Cabinet Secretary for Finance.
Our open letter
Dear UK’s Chancellor of the Exchequer and Scotland’s Cabinet Secretary for Finance,
Urgent action is needed to tackle the climate crisis and deal with its devastating impacts, both in the UK and around the world. But this action must be fair as well as fast. That’s why, together, we urge you to use your respective powers to ensure that those who pollute the most - and who can afford it the most - pay the most towards tackling climate change.
We are calling on you to put in place higher taxes on climate-polluting wealth, starting with fossil-fuelled private jets and superyachts. Powers to act on this call rest variously between Westminster and the Scottish Parliament.
Read the full letter
The impacts of extreme weather are becoming more frequent, more intense and more deadly due to climate change. From flash flooding in South Sudan to extreme heat in Pakistan, climate-change-fuelled disasters are destroying lives, forcing people to leave their homes and pushing communities to the brink of famine. Whether in lower-income countries around the world or here in the UK, it’s people facing poverty who are paying the highest price.
But it’s the wealthiest 1% of people who are disproportionately responsible for the climate crisis. Through their carbon-hungry lifestyles or investments in highly-polluting industries like fossil fuels, they contribute more emissions than two thirds of humanity put together.
This injustice has been enabled by our tax systems which have failed to ensure the wealthiest pay their fair share for far too long, enabling inequality to widen and the climate crisis to spiral. Without fair action, this injustice will deepen.
Globally, trillions of pounds are now needed to stop the crisis from getting worse as well as to support communities hardest hit to get the justice and resources they are calling for.
People living in poverty shouldn’t be paying for a crisis they haven’t caused.
Leading economists and even many millionaires themselves agree that the richest should be taxed more to help to fund a fairer, greener future for us all.
A first step must be to increase taxes on fossil-fuelled private jets and superyachts. The UK is a private jet hotspot and home to a 450-strong fleet of the world’s 6,000 superyachts. These are examples of highly polluting luxuries that only a tiny fraction of people can afford. It would take the average UK citizen almost 11 years to emit as much carbon a single private jet emits in a round trip from London to New York. But while we pay tax on the fuel every time we fill up our car, jet fuel isn't taxed at all and there is no equivalent of vehicle tax for superyachts.
Properly taxing these luxuries across the UK could discourage their use, significantly reducing carbon emissions, and raise up to £2 billion per year. In lower-income countries this money could be used to boost funding for communities rebuilding after climate impacts have hit, while in the UK we could make homes more energy efficient and improve public transport for everyone.
The money is there and there’s no more time to lose. Further steps to better tax the ultra-rich are urgently needed to help to speed up climate action and fight inequality, and fair taxes on polluting private jets and superyachts are a crucial first step.
You have the responsibility and the opportunity to take the bold action needed for a fairer, more sustainable future for everyone – we urge you to take it.
We the undersigned
