Environmental laws and public compliance: IELTS Speaking Part 3 questions and answers

I'd argue that laws work faster, but education makes the change last. A ban or a fine changes behaviour almost overnight, because people want to avoid penalties. However, if they don't understand why the rule exists, they'll often go back to old habits once enforcement slips. Teaching children about waste and pollution, for example, creates adults who recycle without being told. So ideally the two should work together, with laws setting the standard and education building support for it.

Mostly, I think, because breaking them seems to have no immediate consequence. If someone drops litter or burns rubbish, they rarely see the harm it causes, and the chances of being caught are slim. Convenience plays a part too; a plastic bag is simply easier than remembering a cloth one. In some cases, people also feel the rules are unfair, especially if they see large companies polluting freely while ordinary citizens are fined for minor offences.

Absolutely, because for large companies, a small fine is just a business expense they can easily absorb. Penalties need to be big enough that polluting costs more than cleaning up their processes. If a factory knows that dumping waste into a river will cost it far more than installing proper treatment equipment, it will change its behaviour. Ideally, the money raised should also go directly towards repairing the damage, such as restoring polluted rivers or farmland.

I think governments carry the greater responsibility, simply because they have far more power. An individual can recycle carefully, but only a government can invest in clean public transport, regulate industry or protect forests by law. That said, individuals still matter, since policies only succeed when people follow them. For instance, a city can provide separate bins for recycling, but if residents keep mixing their rubbish, the system fails. It really has to be a shared effort.

I believe they do, although progress is slower than many people would like. Agreements such as the one signed in Paris in 2015 give countries shared targets and put public pressure on governments to report their progress. Without them, each country would be tempted to wait for others to act first. The weakness, of course, is that they are hard to enforce, so their success depends largely on whether national governments turn promises into actual policies.