by Will Jones
The Conservative Party has abandoned the “impossible” Net Zero 2050 target in a major U-turn, overturning a decades long cross-party consensus on tackling the ‘climate emergency’. Tory leader Kemi Badenoch gave a major speech this morning setting out her reasons for jettisoning the policy and refusing to set a new target. Here are the highlights.
We are living off the inheritance of previous generations. For three centuries every era in our country’s history left a better legacy for our country’s children.
The greatness of the UK is forged by the sacrifices of our ancestors. They built, they innovated and they took tough decisions. They never assumed that prosperity was guaranteed, they made sure it was.
But that has bred an assumption that Britain will always be wealthy. 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. … We are not creating a legacy for the next generation. Worse than that, we are mortgaging our children’s future by not recognising that the world has changed. We’re making things harder and harder for them across the board. …
We suffered the worst defeat in the party’s history. We replaced the principles-based government that brought us success with the managerialism of Labour and gave our power to quangos and courts.
We assumed that we would always be wealthy so we focused on the status quo rather than the future and now Labour is back. They are already making everything worse.
Jobs are disappearing, taxes are rising, and growth is shrinking. They are vandalising education and they are completely clueless of the need for real reform on regulation.
The public made it very clear that the Conservative Party needed some time away from government. Our job now is to use that time wisely – just as Margaret Thatcher and David Cameron did in the generations past.
And just like the 1970s and 2000s, our party cannot shortcut our way back into office with easy answers or rushed announcements.
We must develop credible plans that reflect the shared conservative values of personal responsibility, citizenship, sound money, family, freedom and so much more.
And we start today. By talking about one of the biggest problems that our country, and our world, will face in the decades ahead and show that Conservatives are in the business again of dealing with reality and the problems we face. …
Cheap abundant energy is the foundation of civilisation as we know it today. We mess with it at our peril but that’s exactly what’s been happening for 20 years and it’s now starting to cause real pain for everyday people and business.
The cost of electricity [is] far too high, much higher than nearby and comparative countries. …. A big chunk of our existing bills are not direct energy costs. People are struggling to pay them, businesses, especially manufacturing businesses, are closing down and there is no real plan for bringing costs down.
That surely cannot hold. It’s fantasy politics built on nothing, promising the Earth and costing it too. …
There has never, ever been a detailed plan. Ed Miliband’s Climate Change Act 2008, no plan. Legislating for Net Zero in 2019, no plan. A multi-trillion, 30-year project touching every single aspect of all our lives was decided in 90 minutes without a single vote.
Of the 22 MPs spoke that day, only two sounded notes of caution. I was one of them. I asked for the plan, I asked for it that day, I asked a few days later. And I waited and waited and waited. 845 days later, one came. And it wasn’t enough. …
We need a serious approach, we’ve got to stop pretending it’s simple and we have got to stop government by press release, announcements without a policy plan.
Anyone who has done any serious analysis knows Net Zero cannot be achieved without a significant drop in our living standards, or worse, by bankrupting us.
Without the rest of the world doing the same we are making our country less safe, less secure and less resilient. Let me give you three truths at the heart of Net Zero. First, the published plans are a completely muddle. It is true that the UK has made the greatest progress on carbon emissions in the developed world but we are only responsible for 1% of global emissions. Even if we hit absolute zero we will not have Net Zero around the world if other countries are following us, and they are not. …
Our success at reducing emissions has also come at a cost, the highest energy bills in the developed world. …
The real reason no one in the Labour Government is talking about a proper overall plan is they know it would reveal just how catastrophic the actual costs would be for families, for businesses and for our economy. …
Second, even where there is a plan, we are behind. Let’s look at one easy example. By 2040 the Committee on Climate Change says more than half of UK homes need to rip out boilers and replace them with a heat pump. There is no way we can do that quickly enough on that timescale. …
Heat pumps run on a lot of expensive electricity and it turns out many people just don’t like them. …
Most of them were installed with some form of government subsidy, or as I prefer to call it, taxpayers’ money. …
The good news is that costs have dropped in the last decade. Here’s the less good news. Ten years ago we were heavily dependent on China for all of the key components. Today we’re even more dependent. Look at the top dozen makers of solar panels, they are nearly all Chinese. …
Those three truths are why I call myself a Net Zero sceptic: muddled plans, unrealistic targets and deadlines, over-reliance on China. We have got to start acknowledging what is in plain sight. Net Zero makes us dangerously dependent on countries that don’t share our values and it is risking our own security. …
It is time to stop pretending that everything will be fine. And I am not debating whether climate change exists, it does. I badly want to leave a much better environmental inheritance for my children and for yours. But it doesn’t look like we are going to get remotely close to Net Zero by 2050. … This is what happens when politics turns into fantasy. Maybe some of it will change, but it doesn’t look promising.
I often say that when you want to help someone, you tell them the truth. When you want to help yourself, you tell them what they need to hear. We have to tell the truth.
The plans for Net Zero by 2050 are impossible. We have to do better than this. That’s why as part of our policy renewal we are going to do something that Labour failed to do in 14 years of opposition. We are going to deal with reality, confront the real problems, answer the real questions and be ready with a plan.
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What an amazing speech, she got it all right except for a little wobble at the end about believing in climate change.
We all believe in climate change, at least those of us that can read, it’s just not a very big deal.
Great first step Kemi
Keep your eyes on the ball and keep it rolling.
It was more than a little wobble. She is still convinced fossil fuels are to blame.
All these fools who think the climate had been perfectly stable for thousands of years lack a reasonable education.
Fair Go Rick, Kemi has done the right thing here, just because she hasn’t gone all the way and turned sceptic, is a good reason to praise her and by extension the UK Conservatives for biting the bullet on Net Zero nonsense.
Now the pressure is on UK Labour to admit their energy errors and the same for Labor in Australia as well as our reluctant coalition partners who continue to dither about critical climate/energy issues and the resultant cost of living crisis these policies have given us.
If the coalition ditches Net Zero, it will win the next election.
It’s easy to say this when they are such a minority position in parliament. Where were they for the last 13 YEARS they WERE the government? BoJo was elected says he was going to get rid of all the “GREEN CRAP” , then his missus said no nooky if you do that !!
The only way to get Net Zero is the have ZERO economy and ZERO population. That is what the real agenda is.
Wanted to say vs. had to say (to keep the job)?
Party politicians bend with the wind. Its the only thing they do well.
Finally, a leader who is aware of the creation of wealth. The left assumes that wealthy nations are simply ‘lucky’, and that all will share that luck by sharing the wealth. Nothing could be farther from the truth. Wealth is created by man. Mankind’s wealth is created ONLY when the product of labor exceeds the cost of the labor. Whether it’s mining gold, or building spaceships, there is no wealth unless the result exceeds the cost.
Governments only consume wealth; they don’t create it. That’s why communist nations always become poor. Without changes, the UK will continue along that deadly path.
Third time today WUWT reading has brought to mind the lunar missions.
This is a bombshell in Britain and hopefully the ripples will be felt around the world. Better late than never, but maybe not in time now that Labour has a supermajority!
We’re not there yet, but it’s a step in the right direction
Every journey begins with a first step.
More like Trump rippling around the world.
I like Badenoch. She seemed like an easy choice for party leader and, hopefully, future prime minister.
Dropping Net Zero would be fantastic but it’s an uphill struggle.
Fingers crossed some of the TINOs (Tories in Name Only) will jump ship and be replaced with Tories with a backbone – the sooner the better.
Farage is miles out in front. Badenoch is a thoughtful speaker but she knows the Tories will be decimated further unless they drop NetZero. Farage knows the Climate Scam™ is a scam.
Too late Tories. You are complicit in destroying the UK economy through voting for the Climate Change Act 2008 and not opposing Net Zero by 2050. Only Reform UK can be trusted to get rid of the climate change scam.
At the time, the CCA was described by those in the know as the most expensive ever act of national suicide. And they have been proved right.
I see it the same way, a failed conservative party that will fail the country again regardlesd what they promise. Best examples on the other side of the “Channel” are Germany and Spain and their conservative counterparts (CDU and PP).
Particular curious that both parties rather mingle with left leaning parties than their right wing “cousin” on a federal level. So that’s what you get if you vote hat you’re acustomed to vote: socialism, recession and debt. Loss of freedom and liberties not to mention.
Go and vote and go broke (copied from go woke, go broke)
Time to change old (voting)habits, isn’t it?
The Natives are getting restless. Maybe they will send a message with the next election.
Waiting for pitchforks and torches…..
In other news: UK voters abandon Tories.
They already have abandoned the Tories because, regardless of Climate Change (an issue that almost nobody votes on) the Tories have had 14 years of abject failure.
Jobs are disappearing, taxes are rising, and growth is shrinking.
That’s because of austerity creating record peacetime debt and no investment.
Remember, AGW is not an issue at the ballot box.
Remember, AGW is not an issue at the ballot box.
No, but the size of the electricity bill is!
I think the size of the electricity bill is THE issue.
Badenoch is still pushing the Climate Scam™ like every other UK politician apart from Farage and friends. She is taking an obvious step because 90% of the people in the developed world know NetZero is impossible this century.
The first step for any government is to kill the UN inspired Climate Scam™. Trump is doing it.
The best oppourtunity for the UK is to vote for Farage and his Reform Party. Let the Tories wither on the vine for being so gullible.
It was more than a little wobble. She accepts the scam as her truth.
How can she change course if she believes there is a Climate Crisis?
The only way to put the UK back on track is to change course and that means stopping the subsidy and special payments to windmills and solar and start building coal, natural gas, and nuclear electricity generators.
She could do that to prevent an economic collapse, but what about the End-of-the-World Climate Crisis? How does she justify using fossil fuels if that is an Existential Threat?
Somebody should make it easy for her by convincing her that CO2 is not a danger to humanity in any way, shape or form. There is no evidence that CO2 is anything other than a benign gas, essential for life on Earth. No evidence. None! Where do you get your information from, Kemi? You are being misinformed if you think CO2 is harmful or needs regulation.
That’s your, and most of the other UK politicians problem: You have been seriously misinformed about CO2. It’s understandable. There is a LOT of Climate Crisis propaganda out there. If you don’t know the truth, it’s hard to ignore the propaganda.
But the truth is there is no evidence that CO2 in the atmosphere is harmful to human beings.
Misinformed human beings are spending themselves into bankruptcy trying to fix a CO2 problem that does not exist, and won’t exist.
That’s your problem: You don’t understand the true CO2 situation.
“How can she change course if she believes there is a Climate Crisis?”
“How does she justify using fossil fuels if that is an Existential Threat?”
Standard 1980s build-and-expand video game model. Max out the technology tree by any means needed first then create the desired civilization.
Trump is doing it because he won an election, mostly on the basis of reducing inflation, getting interest rates down, improving the economy, and killing DEI … none of which he is actually accomplishing but for the latter. He is not convincing the masses to change their minds on climate change ideology. And because he has acted so recklessly, ignoring Federal law as well as the Constitution, starting trade wars, and endangering our economy his powers are likely to be very transient and short lived. It is a given that the Dems will win back the House next year, after which he will get nothing through Congress … and he is setting the GOP to lose the White House yet again 2 years later in yet another one of the ongoing voter flip flops.
Most Americans don’t like extremism. I expect the same is true in the UK. Voters want a government that doesn’t hurt things or causes instability, either domestically or internationally. But the extremists on left and right have taken over both major American parties. And so the voter flip flops continue in each election.
“Trump is doing it because he won an election, mostly on the basis of reducing inflation, getting interest rates down, improving the economy, and killing DEI … none of which he is actually accomplishing but for the latter.”
You must not be paying attention.
Inflation is down, interest rates are down, the economy is improving, and DEI is dying.
Here’s what AI says about interest rates:
“Yes, mortgage interest rates have been trending downwards recently, with the average 30-year fixed rate falling to 6.87% in the week ending February 21st, 2025, the lowest level since mid-December.”
Watch Fox News Channel to stay up to date.
Trump’s approval rating is at his high point at 47 percent approval. That’s despite about 95 percent negative coverage from the Far Left Media. A blizzard of anti-Trump propaganda and Trump’s ratings keep going higher. And that’s just in the first two months! Give the guy six months and look out mammaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!
Elon Musk said today he thought Democrats were supposed to be empathetic and good people until he saw all the violence directed against him and his Tesla company just because Elon is helping Trump cut the Democrat fat/fraud out of the U.S. budget.
See, even the richest guy in the world, and probably one of the smartest, can still get fooled by Democrat Propaganda. Democrats have never been empathetic, Elon. It’s all a masquerade; A Front. Joe Biden acted like he cared for the common man. He couldn’t care less. And he is typical of Democrat politicians. It’s all about the political power to them, Elon.
I’m glad to see you are waking up from your political dream and are getting real with Trump. Trump will keep you on the “straight and narrow”.
Elon says he has also uncovered about $200 billion in Democrat election fraud having to do with bringing in illegal aliens, putting them in swing States where 10,000 or 20,000 votes will swing the election, and the Democrats import 200,000 illegal aliens into the State, and manage to get them to vote, and swing the State to the Democrats into the foreseeable future. A Diabolical Plan, to be sure. A treasonous plan. A Dictators plan.
I’ll be interested to see more details about this.
Lots of Democrat crime to be investigated.
The popularity of the Democrat party has dropped to 29%.
Don’t pat Trump on the back for reduced inflation. He’s only been in office for two months. It takes longer than that just to collect the data.
Yes, that’s true for all of the economic data.
I’m waiting for “them” to declare the recession and blame it on Trump’s first month.
“I’m waiting for “them” to declare the recession and blame it on Trump’s first month.”
Oh, yes! You can count on the Democrats to blame anything and everything on Trump. They are just waiting for their opportunity.
Biden puts the U.S. economy in the tank, but Trump will be blamed for any problems caused by Biden policy.
But the criticism won’t last long, imo, because I think Trump’s actions are going to stimulate the U.S. economy very much and the economic problems are going to disappear.
The United States will be moving forward. All it needs is a good leader. One who takes the brakes off the economy by reducing regulations and reducing taxes. The American economy will take it from there.
“He’s only been in office for two months.”
This is true. And Democrats are complaining that the economy has not immediately turned around after Trump’s election. They are making Trump out to be a failure before he has even got comfortable in his Oval Office chair.
They won’t be saying this in six months. They will have lost their talking point by that time. Things will be looking a lot better, and there won’t be any confusion as to why: Trump.
And the border is much more secure than it was three months ago.
Yes, and Joe Biden and the Democrats lied and said the only way to control the border was for Congress to pass new immigration laws.
Trump has shown that to be a blatant lie by the Democrats. It didn’t take new legislation to curb illegal immigration, all it took was a new president.
Biden could have done the same thing any time he wanted, but he didn’t want to curb illegal immigration, instead he wanted to promote it.
Joe Biden is a despicable human being. His presidency was a horror show.
The Dems tried running on not Trump last year. How did that go?
Typically the party not in power gains seats and the sitting president’s party loses seats in the midterms. While I don’t have a computer model crystal ball and therefore can’t make scientific future predictions, let’s review the Democrat platform as it’s shaping up (in no particular order):
More biological men in women’s locker rooms, more boys in girl’s toilets, more irreversible harm to childrenNo deportation of criminal illegal aliens, more benefits for illegal aliens, including free housing and other benefits not available to US citizensNo reduction in bloated government but more and more governmentNo auditing spending for fraud waste and abuseForever war in Ukraine. US keeps propping up Nato; no requirement for other members to pull their own weight
“Forever war in Ukraine.“
That is a one sided perspective.
Analysis of alternatives is missing.
Most people voted for Trump in 2016 and in 2024 specifically because he is disruptive and want the status quo overturned and complacency vanquished.
I do not believe the mid-term election is a done deal, nor the 2028 Federal election.
A single snapshot is not a motion picture.
Right. If the scale of fraud and abuse is anything close to what it appears to be from initial reports, and the paper trail proves that politicians on the Left have been funded lavishly by our tax dollars, that will be worse for the Democrats in the midterms than Watergate ever was for Republicans.
The caveat is that we can probably expect plenty of Uniparty Republicans are also feeding at the trough and may have enough power to keep this under wraps. We have no real majority in either the House nor the Senate, once you lump the crooked RINOs with the Dems.
“The caveat is that we can probably expect plenty of Uniparty Republicans are also feeding at the trough”
Musk said the other day that most of the fraud appeared to be on the Democrat side. He didn’t say all, but he did say most.
Trump is doing the things that will bring down inflation and improve the economy.
The intent is exactly as you state.
The results lie in the future.
The question is, will Trump’s actions succeed and to what degree.
The other question is, what, if any, unintended consequences will result.
He has some good intentions but he is erratic.
Some of what he is doing will bring down inflation. Tariffs will increase inflation.
Tariffs haven’t made any difference in my life. Of course, most ot the tariffs don’t go into effect until April 2, 2025. The tariffs on China, Canada and Mexico are now in effect but you couldn’t tell it from here.
The tariffs that go into effect on April 2, 2025, are reciprocal tariffs, which means, if another country imposes a tariff on the United States, then the United States will impose an equal tariff on that country to make things fair for the United States.
If that country does not want to pay a tariff to the United States, then it can eliminate its own tariff and reduce it to zero, and then the United States will reduce its tariff to zero, also. And then we have a level playing field for everyone.
That’s all Trump wants is a level playing field for all nations. Trump figures Americans will excel in such an environment. I agree.
Duane, you failed to mention getting illegal immigrants that kill our people, rape our women, and traffic children out of the country. For this action alone many will overlook some things you mention.
Please cite the laws he has ignored and parts of the Constitution he ignored.
There are raging debates on many fronts with valid points expressed by both sides.
Of course extremist make claims and those claims are likely invalid in many cases.
We will just have to grab a bucket of popcorn and a beer or six and watch it play out.
“because” US presidents not named FDR get two 4-year terms “his powers are likely to be very transient and short lived.“
Two months into his term, and you’re convinced he’s lost the House in the midterms? You don’t understand the “now generation”. The last two months before the election is all that matters. Besides, the only voters that matter are the 1/3 that are independents, the 1/3 of us who are Republicans will stay the course, and the 1/3 who are democrats will vote against the Republican candidates regardless of anything.
Let’s wait to see if she will follow President Trump and promises to pull the UK out of the Paris Agreement. Until she does that there’s absolutely no reason to get excited.
“90% of the people in the developed world know”
Sure?
To add on to my previois comment:
Anyone who somehow mentions the phrase “climate change” should generally not be trusted.
There is no such thing as climate change. The world climate flucutates naturally as it always has, to call these fluctuations a change is like calling a fixed pendulum swinging going in circles.
The hollow phrase “climate change” means nothing less than “I want your money and while I’m at it also screw you over”.
arghh typo…previous….there fixed it, sorry
Ah! So the previous that previously wasn’t previous, is now previous?
indubitably
You seem well practiced in the art of cancel culture. But not so well practiced in the art of politics and winning elections.
Climate change is a statistical construct. Climate is an average of weather over a defined time interval, generally applied to locals or regions.
Climate change is happening every second, 24/7/365. The weather at this moment is not exactly the same as 30 years ago (or whatever timeframe), so the climate is changing. It is, after all, a running average.
Unfortunately, the masses have been programmed to understand “climate change” as (a) global and (b) human caused only and (c) an existential threat. So today, climate change is now conflated to have the same definition as CACC or CAGW. We can thank the media for this.
Words matter. Truth matters. Now, the media instead of holding the torch for truth, honesty, objective news, etc., has become corporate profit centers and has lost its true purpose.
There are two constants. Change which never ceases and truth which never changes.
Natural climate change exists. Climate has always changed, it is changing and will change, as long as there is Earth. These changes are not necessarily just fluctuations. Sun evolves, solar system travels around galaxy center, supernovae explode, meteorites strike, Earth interior evolves, and biosphere also plays a role.
But human caused climate change is an unproven fantasy backed by pure fiction.
Many, perhaps most of those variations are cyclical and are climate change. A major asteroid impact is definitely an exception.
We do not yet know if volcanic eruptions have a cyclical nature. The jury is out on that.
Humans building up cities, laying blacktop, deforestation, agriculture, all of it are outside of the natural variations and are generally not cyclical. Humanity does contribute to climate change BUT the degree is not known. It seems a minor bit role in the grand play of life, the universe and everything.
Many changes are cyclical and many, including most important, are not. Sun evolution and Earth interior are both. Supernovae are not cyclical. Biosphere evolution is not cyclical. Etc.
There is nothing wrong with an idea that humans could affect global climate, but no measurable evidence this has happened so far. A flea changes an elephant weight by an amount probably less than just water vapor exhaled by it every few seconds. A piss in the ocean increases global sea levels, but it is not measurable, let alone a catastrophe.
Humans definitely affect local climates by their land use. And if the Earth greening from human CO2 could measurably affect climate, that would be my first guess of a plausible scenario of a human caused global climate change.
That’s what i call a hypocrite. The ONLY reason this is now put forward is the russophobia and the cramped panic to put money in likely obsolete ‘new’ arms. And to get votes in a next election. All of a sudden this ‘existential climate crisis’ is not so existential. The Tories never gave a flying F about the state of Britain and now the ‘people’ are important all of a sudden?
They are trying to drive a wedge between them and labour but it remains a Blairite Uniparty. And Cameron as some sort of hero? Give us all a break..
I hate to break it to you, but that’s how democracy actually works. You do what the voters want, so you can be elected. She is saying they got it wrong. They want to scrap the Net Zero crap and do better.
Uneducated people might call this pandering to the voter, but it’s just democracy in action.
So, i suppose you assume i am part of the ‘uneducated people’ here. Glossing over the inherent arrogance and misconceptions in your post,your inferences are signs of a feeble mind pretending to be smart by distancing himself from the ‘uneducated’, a clear indicator and red flag to anyone with a functioning brain. Well, i’ll wipe your board clear in a competition…sir.
You don’t have many friends, I take it. You certainly do not know how to participate in a civil discussion, let alone how to put your ideology over the top in winning actual elections.
According to H. Clinton, we are not uneducated people, we are “deplorables.”
Just a nit correction.
Please don’t forget Obama’s “clinging to guns and the Bible” comment.
Noted.
Pointing out your mistakes is an insult?
Thin skin their matey.
As to your claims to being mentally superior, I have yet to see any evidence of that.
I dont feel insulted. I just spit at misconceptions and stupidity. Low lives get zero credit.
Correct. Nigel Farage has been running forever and he and his party hasn’t won squat. The voters don’t trust him and his party because most voters consider them too extreme. A lot of voters vote Labour or Conservative because they always have, as the safer choice. In a parliamentary system a small party only has any influence whatsoever if they are needed by a larger party to form a majority coalition … and then they join hands with those who sometimes don’t agree with their policy prescriptions …because it is clearly better to win some of the time than to lose all of the time.
The great Ronald Reagan was so successful in the US because he knew how to form and manage coalitions of highly disparate interests – religious, ant-taxers, pro-business, anti-government, pro defense (those last two are clearly incompatible on a purely ideological basis), pro-free trade, and pro-nationalism, and also social conservatives who are not necessarily religious.
Reagan’s mantra delivered to his coalition members was simply, “Your 80% ally is not your 20% enemy.”
Or as the American patriots in 1770s New England told their highly disparate fellow colonists from New York to Georgia, “Join or die!”
Coalitions get stuff done. Ideological purists who don’t know how to play well with others are feckless failures.
“because they always have”
(why quote one little phrase then add no commentary? It’s an important phrase, and the motive for +1, and worth thinking about)
True and in the process you dance to the fiddler called public opinion, driven by biased polls, etc. Positions change like a flag flapping in the wind.
Yes. Also public opinion is often manipulated by the parties. This is why referenda seldom delivers good results. It might look highly democratic but the problem is, while all may have an opinion, not all opinion is of equal Quality. Better to elect very intelligent, informed and ethical people and have them do the hard work. I mean independents rather than party decorations.
Clarifying point: It is not how democracy works. It is how elections work. Nuanced difference, but not uncritical.
Ah, yes. How this particular, albeit somewhat flawed, version of democracy works, I guess.
While she still holds onto the narrative of Man Made Climate Change being a thing, there is no hope for the Tory Party.
Every thinking person knows climate change exists. There is no hazard in that statement or any debate needed.
The debate and the error being progressed by the Uniparty within British politics is the scale of climate change caused by man.
We can all agree, human activity can impact climate, that is possible but the degree to which it is possible is what has been exaggerated. That uncertainty of climate impact scale, has been used for malicious purpose by so called progressive thinkers.
The other part of the climate change debate the attribution of actual change is never even discussed in the public space.
The BBC have declared those who do not openly agree its all man made climate change are banned from their programs with no debate allowed.
The science is settled according to the BBC and in that one sentence they are condemned by their own left wing prejudice/ignorance.
It should be remembered, Theresa May the Tory PM introduced the Net Zero legislation in 2019 without debate in the House of Commons. She simply appended the most destructive policy in British history to the existing Climate Change Act of 2008, introduced by Ed Miliband during a previous Labour government.
The Tories have done the greatest damage to the Nation via the Net Zero legislation, they own it. Until they come out and clearly state, they will repeal it along with the Climate Change Act 2008, what we see from Kemi B is simply electioneering rhetoric.
The May 1st elections are looming large when the bulk of the nation will elect new local councils. The Tory wipe out that happened at the general election will be replicated at the Council elections but it will be the Reform party not Labour, that removes Tory councillors.
The national decline over the past twenty years is grim to see, the fiddling around the edges on offer from the Westminster old guard politicians will not be enough to stop the carnage they have induced.
The Nation needs complete Reform in local councils and in Westminster.
The clue is in the name.
Dude – she says net zero is an abject failure.
You guys on this thread, wow just wow! You don’t know how to take “yes” for an answer, or how to pocket a major victory and then move on. Apparently you guys would much prefer to polish your ideological apples than to win a policy victory.
She said Net Zero by 2050 is impossible and the costs of trying to achieve is are failing the country.
She did not come out and explicitly proclaim that net zero was an abject failure.
She did not say the Net Zero was a wrong target and also a target unattainable in principle. She did not say that CO2 is not a pollutant and green transition is a scam. To her it it is still a desirable target, just the means and pace of change need to be adjusted, plus concern that only China rips the economic benefits (and this is wrong well, because Chinese do not share our values).
In other words, the parasitic climate-industrial complex is trying to find a safe sustainable level at which it can co-exists with real economy perpetually sucking life out of it.
Why is England chasing net zero? Does anyone know who would be better off?
Precisely. The Uniparty needs to avoid killing the host quite as fast as it has been.
Her position on Net Zero is not we must shut down Net Zero. Her position is we need to redefine the boundaries of Net Zero. By adopting that stance she is trying to keep her LibDem colleagues in the Tory Party on side while trying to claim she wants to do something about the disaster that is Net Zero.
Her position is compromised by the existing Tory Party MPs many of whom are not Conservatives at all.
As a trained engineer she knows it is all complete nonsense progressing Net Zero but she is afraid to speak the truth.
She may have once been a trained engineer, but today she is a politician.
And we need to call them out for what they are: spineless actors playing a role, for THEIR benefit, at a convenient time. We need politicians with backbone who are brave enough to stand up against the prevailing wind, not those who can see the writing on the wall when the tide turns and ride the opportunity. Turncoats..
Yes. She must abandon her education and ethics for the sake of party politics. The party corrupts everything and everybody.
How the hell do you conclude from his post that it has anything to do with ideology? He is simply calling a spade a spade, as i was..
Hindsight.. it’s a wonderful thing. Problem is that had they won the last election, the tories would still be pursuing the net zero fantasy with only slightly less vigour than labour now. They don’t have rubbergob Milliband, but they were just as keen to tax air and plug wells until they were forced into introspection. A day late and a dollar short, as our transatlantic cousins would say. Actually, a few billion dollars short as we have already wasted eye watering amounts, and the commitments they made still to be met when they were in power.
Hindsight beats no sight.
“It is time to stop pretending that everything will be fine. And I am not debating whether climate change exists, it does.”
So still no progress really. To stop this rot we need repeal of the Climate Change Act 2008 and rejection of Net Zero. The elephant is becoming so large in the room that soon no MP will fit in. The public can see it already, the Reform party can see it. How much bigger does the problem have to get, how much more catastrophic the impact on the UK economy before they finally call it out and announce the repeal of the CCA2008 as a manifesto policy commitment?
While Badenoch still believes “climate change exists” the only policies she can propose will be delaying policy impositions, or fiddling around the edges. Like the delay Sunak announced from 2030 to 2035 for ICE new vehicle sales ban, without changing the annual escalating EV sales quotas that will kill the car industry anyway. Political posturing only.
Over 40% of her parliamentary MP’s (50 out of 121 of them) are fully signed up supporters at the Conservative Environment Network (CEN), the big money funded “climate crisis” lobby group for right of centre parties. Add in some other net zero supporting MPs in the party who are not CEN members and she may not even command 50% of the parliamentary MP’s to support a change.
Long way to go yet. And then they also have to commit to repealing the Human Rights Act and withdrawal from the ECHR before I’ll even think about voting for them again.
This is as profound as declaring the world isn’t flat because cats would knock everything off if it were.
Yes…. but listen to this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CEshBHrzm-8
This is Ed Miliband, UK Minister for Energy and Net Zero, taking questions this week on Energy and Net Zero. Ed is a lunatic of course, but his questioners are, with one or two exceptions, also equally lunatic.
The piece starts with a few remarks from the Speaker on administrative topics, and then launches right into it.
One highlight is where he declines to explain why he is not going to assess the costs of net zero. Why he cancelled the previous government’s plan to do that. Don’t bother me with details, I am saving the planet, lowering prices, bringing you all energy security beyond your wildest dreams.
If you can manage to watch all the way through Ed’s performance, you will then find yourself watching as Liz Kendall explains how reducing future welfare payments by $5 billion (if she is lucky) out of a business as usual total of £100 billion is somehow going to save the country from the pending welfare crisis or disaster or whatever you want to call it.
There is a real crisis in the UK, and its not climate, Its on plain view every day on the Parliament Channel, and its even preserved for an unbelieving posterity in Hansard.
I guess this is a Story Tip.
Yeah, nah. Not watching a couple of hours of insane waffle. Any clue as to what point these things are said?
It is worth listening to. To get an idea of just how out of touch and conformist to the prevailing ideology British MPs are. You may think you know, and maybe you do in general. But till you have seen it in action the full extent and force of the phenomenon can’t be grasped. And its implications for life and the economy in Britain in the near term.
You may think you know about avalanches, and maybe you do. But when you see one close by its still a most educational experience, and one that keeps you away from risky slopes forever.
Read carefully, the 2050 Net Zero target has been dropped, achieving Net Zero at some point has not.
In fairness to the Tories, a target with no date is effectively dropped. It will never happen.
Net Zero was never the real goal of those who have arithmetic skills. Creating climate-industrial complex and having everybody pay for it was the goal. But it was supposed to be functional and make money for them. What they are really concerned about is that instead of making a lot of money on it they also lose money. So, they are trying to adjust.
‘In fairness to the Tories’ is not a phrase I would have expected to see in an MCourtney post, I must say. Is it sarcasm?
Albo explains net zero in your wallet come bill day-
Anthony Albanese claims ‘global inflation’ is preventing a reduction in power prices
Well that was a great start, but agreeing that Climate Change( Human Induced) which is what I believe she meant…..is a problem is just baseless rubbish…sometimes I think the rhetoric is deliberately being run on superslow. After all, whether we like it or not, we have to drag these knuckleheads along with us. Them having to adjust to the bitter reality of having been wrong for so long must be very tough…..
I think you just explained why the judicial branch was designed to represent the views of the previous generation and congress was designed to represent the views (though not the hairstyles) of the next generation.
I see the Tufton Street gang were there in force.
Quelle surprise.
UK Net Zero has nothing to do with climate. It has no conceivable effect on it. Its a failed and failing energy policy, and that’s all it is. Uncosted, ineffective, impractical, unaffordable. A recipe for blackouts and economic and social decline.
So, you are inferring she was bought?
Ahahahahaha. What a conspiracy rag. No wonder you’re so malinformed about everything.
Linking to ultra-leftist site that supports Hamas, supports Just Stop Oil, supports violent demonstrations, supports muslim extremists, supports paedophiles and LGB trans perverts, supports leftist racist agendas, supports ‘males pretending to be females so they can win something’. etc etc etc
Not a good look. !!
The world was once moving away from carbon and to nuclear to power the economy … because nuclear was and is safe, clean, reliable and less expensive than almost any other source of electric power. Then the world went crazy.
Time to get back … kicking and screaming … back onto the nuclear track. Let’s hope.
It might have seemed like one of the weirder headlines of 2024: Microsoft is paying $1.6 billion to restart Three Mile Island. That’s the nuclear power plant in Pennsylvania whose reactor #2 had a partial meltdown in 1979.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/big-techs-big-bet-on-nuclear-power-to-fuel-artificial-intelligence/
I am not clear that partial meltdown is exactly what happened.
That aside, it is not reactor #2 the MS is attempting to bring back online.
Nuclear is OK in its own way, but no need to move away from carbon.
Hydrocarbons have extremely well known benefits.
Coal also.
People are carbon. No place on earth one can move away to and avoid carbon.
“The world was once moving away from carbon and to nuclear to power the economy … because nuclear was” a great technology for making bombs bigger.
She said, “climate change” but she did not say “Catastrophic Anthropogenic Climate Change.”
Climate is changing second by second, 24/7/365 and always has and always will.
The real question, and most of understand the real answer, is it a “the sky is falling” moment?
It might as well be for different reasons, but even if it were, it would not be human fault.
There is no justification for taxing everybody.
Well, meteors happen and that is the sky falling in a sense.
The title says ‘Tories abandon Net Zero’. Wrong. The text in the article, however, gets it right: ‘The Conservative Party has abandoned the “impossible” Net Zero 2050 target’. All that they have abandoned is the date previously set by which Net Zero must be achieved.For all we know, they’ll set a target of 2060.
So, adopting previous church approach, the Second Advent does not need to have a specific date, but tithes must be paid indefinitely.
A major improvement, but she still assumes that Net Zero is something worth doing.
Hurrah. Net Zero achieves NOTHING but povertyy. It has NO SCIENTIFIC BASIS
Having read all the comments posted so far, I am seeing that many are posting based on personal interpretations and thus are personal opinions.
To be clear, there is absolutely nothing wrong with that!
I recommend to everyone: Read every comment.
Put aside your quick reaction response and consider each post.
Look for validity in each point made.
Consider all of the points of view before forming an update to your personal point of view.
Some are keying on specific words or phrases.
When reading the comments and the articles, one must be cautious to not read out of context.
Just friendly, respectful advice.
Use it to your best advantage or ignore it.
Cheers!
“We are living off the inheritance of previous generations.”
Always true for everyone.
Steam engine: 1700
Flight: 1900
Radio broadcast: 1920
Internet: 1970
Cell phone: 1970
Amazon Launch: 1995
Facebook launch: 2004
“If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants,”
With a federal election coming up within the next 6-8 weeks in Canada, it might be a good idea for the party leaders to examine the rationale of this speech’s arguments and abandon their Net Zero pipe dream as well. In fact, all they have to do is examine their country’s progress in moving toward that target. Canada committed to reducing its 2005 emissions by 40-45% by2030. In actuality, it has reduced them by a mere 8.5% in the past two decades in spite of all the carbon pricing and incentives. So maybe it’s time to throw in the towel in trying for Net Zero.
It is true that she is still clinging to the false notion that added CO2 to the atmosphere will cause catastrophic global warming. That is not what is important. What is important is that she has come to understand that the cure is worse than the disease. That is major. We need her and her followers. Together let’s promote clean and reliable nuclear, gas and much cleaner coal than in the past. Energy that we can afford and rely on instead of expensive renewables that we can’t rely on. Instill in her the necessity of removing unneeded mandates so we can get the country back on a road to wealth and prosperity. She and people like her are the way forward, as we progress she will realize on her own with a little gentle nudging from us that the whole CAGW idea is a fraud and that she has been lied to and cheated. When she and her followers get it we will never look back. I’m with her.