The word lease suggests a contract that allows someone to use land, property or machinery for a period of time without owning it just by making regular payments, such as rent.

It implies that the person leasing is benefiting, in the short term, while having no overall responsibility for the purchase, though the lease will be sufficiently high to completely cover the owners investment. The real benefit of this commercial system is that it’s not necessary to have large amounts of capital as long as there are sufficient funds to pay the regular monthly fees.

This is the background to one of the most worrying developments in the last five years – the enormous number of excessively large expensive cars, often 4X4s, that are frequently seen on our local roads, often in areas that certainly don’t have access to the funding to purchase them outright.

Indeed up to 75 per cent of new cars in the UK are now sold by the personal contract plan form of leasing with the leased vehicle being traded in for a new one after three years. In due course this system will collapse as there will be so many good quality second hand cars available that their price will plummet.

Many leased cars cost well over £40,000 with vehicles such as Land-rover, Audi, Volvo and BMW setting the standard. They frequently have CO2 emissions at over 200 grams per km and even higher for the larger three litre versions.

It’s a prime example of thoughtless, selfish human beings putting their own interest first, and ignoring the CO2 they produce. Both they and the car manufacturers don’t seem to care about the lives of future generations.

These drivers can’t all be ignorant so it seems that showing off wealth is more important personally than the climate disasters they are helping to create.