Sunak's new climate plan is coming next month. Will it add up?
With an impending general election in which cost of living concerns will be front of mind for voters, both Sunak and Starmer were always going to want to evidence their pragmatism, and sensitivity to these public worries, in their approach to dealing with climate change (and everything else for that matter.) Never mind that many green policies should save people money; political pressure became acute after the Uxbridge by-election result.
But by overreaching with a plan centred on scrapping fantasy, non-existent policies (like 'meat taxes' and ‘seven bins’) that nobody in politics supported in the first place, the Prime Minister exposed the thinness of his case for his bonfire of Net Zero policies. Citizens Advice said the steps he announced would actually raise costs for households. The Resolution Foundation warned his giveaway to landlords would mean higher energy bills for many of Britain's poorest households. Carbon Brief's Dr Simon Evans estimates they'll cost renters £2bn a year and drivers £8bn a year. The respected ECIU think tank arrived at similar numbers, and pointed out that the policies in question weren't due to kick-in for another decade so abandoning them won't offer any help to bill payers anytime soon.
In fact, with gas prices likely to stay higher for longer (after Saudi Arabia and Russia’s decision to cut production), Sunak’s decision to go into the next winter energy bills crisis arguing landlords should not have to upgrade tenants’ properties to lower their bills may become a fresh political problem for him.
By also triggering a full-scale revolt from Corporate Britain - in particular, from the auto-sector - Sunak also undermined his central argument that he is restoring economic stability after the Truss 'mini budget.' Coming so soon after the botched clean energy auction, which failed to procure any new offshore wind farms, businesses are becoming more vocal about what all this chopping and changing of climate policy means for jobs and investment. KPMG warns the UK is becoming a less attractive place to invest. Sooner or later Sunak will have to confront this charge from business leaders, and the Financial Times, that his green choices are hurting Britain's economic recovery.
With endorsements for his climate u-turns from Donald Trump and Liz Truss over the weekend, Sunak will likely wish to soon remind voters of the other part of his speech where he said he remains committed both to achieving Net Zero by 2050, and meeting the climate targets that Britain signed up to for 2030. As Alok Sharma set out in The Observer yesterday, the onus is now on the PM to show how he plans to do that.
Ministers are legally obliged to update MPs in the House of Commons on how they intend to make their carbon numbers add up by the end of next month. (The Energy Minister confirmed last week they will set out their response to the CCC's latest progress report "by the end of October.") Soon after, Sunak will head to the UN Climate Summit in the UAE where he could face questions from other world leaders on this point.
When his new Energy Secretary, Claire Coutinho, does bring the government's fresh climate plan before Parliament in the next few weeks, it may start the clock on renewed legal action by green groups given the difficulties Sunak's own advisers (and independent analysts) say that he will have in offering a credible alternative glide path to meeting the UK's Paris Agreement commitments.
Sunak may spy a short-term political opportunity from any legal action by activists. He may see a medium-term one too if he were able to win a Parliamentary majority on a manifesto commitment not to implement Net Zero-necessary changes; this might blunt the High Court's room for manoeuvre.
Of course, most significant will be how voters respond to Sunak's big Net Zero gamble. The Tory strategist and pollster James Frayne wrote for Con Home last week that three reactions have emerged from voter focus groups so far:
“Firstly, most strongly, people suggested it would show the Conservatives couldn’t be trusted because it was yet another broken promise they’d gone back on. Secondly, people said it would show the Conservatives were incompetent because it would indicate they couldn’t hit a target some 30 years into the future. Thirdly, people said it would be unfair for those people who had, for example, already bought an EV or a heat pump.”
This would seem to chime with what Sam Freedman found when he examined recent polling data for the IPPR, and concluded:
"The political difficulties of imposing specific costs on voters can’t be ignored, and challenges with ULEZ are a good reminder that environmental policies still need to be well designed with targeted support for those who can afford the least. The far bigger political danger, though, is being caught on the wrong side of a visibly growing problem and looking complacent or blind to the risk…. Any politician who, looking at the data we have, concludes it’s all too difficult and people are unpersuadable, is in the wrong job."
If Sunak's u-turn does end up backfiring for him, perhaps it will make the Conservative Party think twice about doubling down on a more sceptical position after the general election.