Mark Andrews on Saturday: Nastiness of envy, honesty about green growth, and why bigotry isn't a reason to send people to jail

A BBC documentary this week, provocatively titled The Decade The Rich Won, portrayed Britain as a country bitterly divided between the haves and have-nots, with wealthy oppressors feathering their nests at the expense of the downtrodden poor.

Protestors outside St Paul's Cathedral in London as people protest against the global financial system. PRESS ASSOCIATION Photo. Picture date: Saturday October 15, 2011. Anti-capitalist protests that started with the Occupy Wall Street movement spread to London and other cities today. Thousands of people descended on the area around the London Stock Exchange in a bid to replicate the huge demonstrations which have been taking place in New York. See PA story PROTEST City. Photo credit should read: Yui Mok/PA Wire

It is a seductive argument. In the 24-hour media age, who isn't irritated by the mega-wealthy with their fast cars, champagne-soaked parties and yachts in Marbella, particularly as you head out to the night shift.

But this obsession with equality is also unhealthy. Yes, the rich have become richer over the past century, and the gap may well have widened. But does it really matter?

Most of us are pretty rich by historic standards. People with double-glazed homes, 32in televisions and mobile phones now classify themselves as poor, luxuries which just half a century ago would have marked them out as decidedly well off.

Of course real poverty hasn't been eradicated, but there are few people in this country who experience it in a way that most people in the world would understand. Maybe the British Broadcasting Corporation should celebrate how privileged we are to live in such a great, wealthy country, rather than stirring up envy and resentment.

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Unless, of course, you subscribe to the view of the environmentalist and Guardian columnist George Monbiot, who believes economic growth has brought the world to the brink of environmental catastrophe.

Monbiot says: "There is no such thing as green growth. Growth is wiping the green from the Earth." In other words, sustainability means making the world poorer. Something you rarely hear from politicians.

Monbiot may well be extreme and eccentric, but at least he's honest.

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Joseph Kelly sounds a nice chap, doesn't he?

The militant Scottish nationalist marked Captain Tom Moore's passing by posting his picture on Twitter, with the caption: 'the only good Brit soldier is a deed one, burn auld fella, buuuuurn'.

Very tasteful. Presumably, he would prefer life under the jackboots of German soldiers who Captain Moore fought against.

Joe now faces the prospect of up to six months in the slammer after being convicted of offences under communications law.

Yet revolting though this guy obviously is, I hope he doesn't go to prison. I don't want to live in a society that jails people for their opinions, no matter how unsavoury they might be. It's just not, well, British.

Besides, making him spend a season in the Govan stand at Ibrox, preferably wearing his Celtic shirt with his name on the back, would be far more effective.

The irony is that Scotland is now even worse than England for this totalitarian nonsense – thanks to oppressive new 'hate' laws passed by, er, the Scottish Nationalists. Och, aye.