Pat McFadden, Cabinet Office minister, says changes to be announced today are about giving people ‘hope of work in the future’
Kemi Badenoch is speaking now.
She starts by saying that we are living off the inheritance of our ancestors.
We are a wealthy country, but we are becoming weaker through complacency. We are losing our resilience. We can’t make things like we used to. We don’t build as quickly. We are spending too much on debt, too much on welfare and too little on defence. We are not growing like we should be …
if you look at real disposable income or GDP per capita or home ownership, you will see that things are stagnating or going backwards. In 1974 you could save up for a deposit to buy a house in less than six months. Now, the average time is more than 11 years.
The past few years have taught us the surest route to falling living standards is staying hooked on volatile, expensive and polluting fossil fuels. Throwing in the towel on our climate goals means giving up on making life better for British people now and in the future. With green industries growing three times faster than the rest of the UK economy, it also means giving up on the economic opportunity of the century.
It is a mistake for Kemi Badenoch to have jumped the gun on her own policy review and decided net zero isn’t possible by 2050. This undermines the significant environmental legacy of successive Conservative governments who provided the outline of a credible plan for tackling climate change. The important question now is how to build out this plan in a way that supports growth, strengthens security, and follows conservative, free market principles …
The net zero target is driven not by optimism but by scientific reality; without it climate change impacts and costs will continue to worsen. Abandon the science and voters will start to doubt the Conservative Party’s seriousness on the clean energy transition, damaging both growth and the fight against climate change.
Given that we need to reach net zero emissions to stop greenhouse gases increasing and so the ever worsening floods and heatwaves driven by climate change, any sense of giving up on the goal 25 years before the finish line, particularly when the UK has made good progress, seems premature.
It is certainly technologically and economically feasible for the UK to hit net zero emissions and the clear majority of the British public back the net zero emissions target seeing renewables and clean technology as the top growth sector. The UK’s net zero economy grew by 10% in 2024, and momentum towards renewables and electrification globally is only going in one direction, so any signal of a slowdown is a recipe for investor uncertainty and economic jeopardy.
It was a Conservative government that provided global leadership in setting a net zero emissions target since which more than three-quarters of global GDP is now covered by a net zero commitment.
As the public continue to experience the catastrophic impacts of an economic crisis driven largely by the price of gas, it is disappointing to see Kemi Badenoch turn her back on cleaner, cheaper, homegrown energy. And given the proud record of the Conservative party on the environmental agenda, it is even more disappointing to see the leader of the opposition take cues from climate deniers across the pond.
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