My Letter to Constituents on Prorogation and No Deal Brexit

Dear Resident

I am writing to update you on the extraordinary events that are taking place in our country. As my constituent, I consider it is my duty to let you know where I stand on these issues and what action I propose to take.

The Prime Minister is proroguing parliament in order to take the UK out of the European Union without having any agreement in place about the future terms of our trade or security arrangements. I believe that he is wrong, both in what he is trying to achieve,  and in the unconstitutional way he is going about achieving it.

Prorogation is simply a technical manoeuvre to prevent parliament legislating to ensure the government does not take the UK out of the EU without a deal. Some cabinet ministers, embarrassed by their own previous dismissal of the very idea of Prorogation, are now trying to claim that this is only an extended conference recess. Here is the difference: Parliament can be recalled in a recess; in Prorogation it cannot. Prorogation normally lasts 8 days. This one lasts 5 weeks!

In fact the last time we had an extended Prorogation was in 1997 when the Conservative Prime Minister, John Major, wanted to prevent Parliament from holding the government to account for the Cash for Questions Scandal before the General Election. Ironic then, that even John Major has now joined in to support the legal challenge to the Prime Minister to stop this Prorogation.

On the question of leaving the European Union without a deal, it is important to recall what Brexiteer ministers said at the time. We were told that this would be “the easiest deal in human history”. And “We will have forty new Free Trade Agreements lined up ready to go for 1 minute after midnight on Brexit day”.  Well, after three years that is not quite how it has turned out! But the point here is not to look back and mock the hubris and overconfidence of ministers, it is to be clear that leaving without a deal was never a prospect put to the British people. Those who voted to leave, voted to leave with a deal that set out clearly our trade and security relations. The Prime Minister has no mandate for No Deal.

It was interesting to me that the first person to speak on the Stop the Coup demonstration in London last weekend was actually a leave voter. He said he voted to leave to take back control to our sovereign parliament, not to have our sovereign parliament silenced by an unelected prime minister!

Last week the Leader of the Labour Party met with all the other minority party leaders and there was a unanimous agreement that we must put the country before party. That is why we have determined that we will pursue a legislative solution that tries to ensure that the UK does not leave the EU without a deal. Many Conservative members of Parliament are agreed on this course of action and will be supporting the emergency motion that I will be backing today. Some of those people want to leave the EU, many of us do not, but all of us are agreed that a no deal departure would have disastrous consequences for our country. That is why, putting aside party political differences, we will try to secure a binding piece of legislation to that end.

I do not believe that the Prime Minister actually wants a deal. Despite meeting Chancellor Merkel more than two weeks ago, he has still not put forward any proposals to the EU setting out alternative arrangements to the backstop. That is because there are none. Remember he was the Foreign Secretary at the start of the negotiations, David Davis was the first Brexit Secretary, Dominic Raab was the second: they could not find an alternative to the backstop then and they do not have one now.

The Prime Minister has threatened to deselect Conservative MPs who vote against him. He has implied that he will call a general election if parliament defeats him this week. I certainly do not shy away from a general election. I would dearly like our country to focus on sorting out the underfunding of our schools, the desperate lack of social care for older people and the scourge of knife crime. This week though, our priority is in working together with MPs all across parliament to protect the country from the ravages of a No Deal disaster.

I trust you will consider that this is the right course of action.

Barry meets Mexican Congresswoman Xochitl Zagal to discuss climate change

Barry met with Deputy Xochitl Zagal, the Coordinator for Environment and Natural Resources for the Parliamentary Group of MORENA, the government party in Mexico. Deputy Zagal met with Barry to discuss UK-Mexico cooperation on climate change.

Joint Statement on Climate Change from Dip. Xòchitl Zagal (MORENA, Mexico) & Barry Gardiner MP (Labour Party, U.K.)

We declare that the planet is facing a climate and environment emergency that threatens the peace, development and prosperity of our countries. We share a deep sense of concern that further ecological breakdown will only worsen the gross and unfair inequalities in our societies, disproportionately affecting the poorest and most vulnerable persons the greatest.

We therefore call for an immediate, global response to address this crisis; and, in doing so, we reaffirm our mutual commitment to meeting the Paris Agreement’s aim to limit global warming to 1.5°C and the Sustainable Development Goals.

To that end, we support the UN Secretary General’s call for all nations to submit new, updated Nationally Determined Contributions to the Paris Agreement before 2020 that represent progressions beyond their existing pledges.

We recognise, however, that promises and targets alone are insufficient to arrest catastrophic climate change. We therefore strongly urge our respective governments to bring forward new policies that will deliver the decarbonisation of our respective economies, noting that renewable electricity generation can serve as a source of cheap, low-carbon power that is affordable to all, while also enhancing energy security and improving access to energy.

Given that climate change is already threatening the survival of our societies, particularly impacting the livelihoods of the poorest, we also call for climate change adaptation measures to be strengthened.

Moreover, we express our shared concern with the use of fracking (hydraulic fracturing) to extract fossil fuels in our countries, noting in particular the risks this poses to groundwater quality and public health. We believe fracking is incompatible with our shared pursuit of a sustainable planet.

We also note the particular importance of education and youth engagement with enhancing public awareness on climate change. We therefore encourage legislators in our countries to push for climate change and sustainable development to be included on school curriculums at all educational stages so that all generations are informed on how to tackle the climate emergency.

We are alarmed by the ongoing wildfires engulfing the Amazon Rainforest and condemn President Bolsonaro of Brazil for failing to tackle this crisis. We urge President Bolsonaro to accept the funding offered by the G7 to help support Brazil in extinguishing these wildfires.

We pledge to continue to work together, as allied sister parties in our respective countries, to fight the climate crisis hand in hand. We are proud of the strength of the UK-Mexico diplomatic relationship that has been instrumental in unlocking ambitious action on climate change in the past, and we seek to build on this cooperative spirit between our parties and our countries in order to accelerate the global transition to a net zero economy.

Barry visits peatland restoration site in Scotland

Healthy peatland is a fantastic store of carbon – in fact, 40% of the UK’s soil carbon is found in our peat.

But for decades our peatland has been degraded and destroyed. Peat for horticulture or for energy in the UK is removed at up to 100 times faster than it can form. Almost all our peatland has been cultivated, grazed, drained or burned for game management, excavation or agriculture. Of over 1.4 million hectares of peatland in England, less than 1% remains undamaged. In fact, our peatland has become so degraded it is now a net emitter of greenhouse gases, particularly in the lowlands which accounts for just 7% of our peatland area but a shocking 40% of their emissions.

To reach net zero emissions by 2050, as the government have legislated to do, the Committee on Climate Change have called for us to make 55% of peatland in good condition by 2050, up from just 25% today.

To see how this could be possible, Barry visited a peat restoration site run by Scottish Natural Heritage, where years of mismanagement are being undone to create a healthy peat ecosystem that plays a crucial role in tackling climate change and providing a habitat for biodiversity.

Barry writes in LabourList: “Why Boris Johnson’s plan for ‘free ports’ isn’t a good idea”

I suspect that Liz Truss must be one of the new cabinet ministers most feared by civil servants. They will work readily for any minister irrespective of their political views. They respect a minister who knows their own mind and can argue their department’s case in cabinet. But they fear a zealot. A minister who is so convinced of his or her own rectitude that they are unwilling to engage with or even listen to their civil servants.

Amidst the bluster and bravado that has come to define the new Prime Minister, civil servants are having to deal with the very real threat of a no-deal Brexit. Now they see, with the recent announcement of “free ports”, the fast-tracking of a deregulatory, low-tax agenda that many consider has been the zealots’ real project all along. We’re a step closer to the prospect of the UK becoming a bargain basement economy. The government’s intention to open ten new free ports will not help our just-in-time supply chain to keep jobs in manufacturing; it will not enable perishable food or medicines to reach our supermarkets and hospitals quicker in the event of a no deal. Why, then, are they suddenly a political priority?

That they are is a chilling indication of the degree to which the Conservative Party has been captured by the zealots. Free ports were actually discontinued by David Cameron’s Conservative government in 2012 on the grounds that “the UK’s current customs facilitations offer broadly the same benefits that attract businesses to free zones in other developed countries, such as the United States”. Now these customs-exempt territories, which allow goods to be stored and processed without attracting tariffs, are deemed to be central to defining Britain’s new economy.

We have a government that has failed to ensure the new Customs Declaration Service is equipped to handle changes to trade; failed to properly prepare businesses for those changes; and is now trying to claim that free ports, by exempting goods from customs procedures, might make things easier at the border.

What the Tories are actually proposing are free trade zones (FTZs) under the auspices of free ports. This is where significant tax breaks are given to investors, where the super-rich can store property tax-free and where manufacturing can take place under a different (read: more lax and less worker friendly) regulatory regime to that of the rest of the country. This is not, as the zealots sometimes claim, a way of boosting the economy of our hard-pressed coastal towns. In fact, it is a way of relocating industry and manufacturing companies away from other areas of the country and getting coastal communities to work without the same rights and protections that previous workers in those companies enjoyed.

The policy is sponsored by the new Chief Secretary to the Treasury, Rishi Sunak. He wrote the book on free ports and Liz Truss was amongst the handful of the new right who drafted Britannia Unchained, alongside Kwasi Kwarteng, Dominic Raab, Priti Patel and Chris Skidmore. The book is considered by some as the unofficial manifesto of the new government, wherein they call for FTZs with substantial tax breaks, minimal regulation and exemption from duties. Johnson has publicly declared his support for such proposals — a fact unconnected, I am sure, from the £25,000 donation he received from one aspiring free port.

What does the evidence actually suggest that these FTZs do? A 2011 review by the World Bank found many had become “white elephants”, with the cost of revenue lost to the Exchequer outweighing the benefits. The Economist reported that they create distortions in economies, and that many leave a long trail of failed zones that either never got going, were poorly run or in which investors gladly took tax breaks without producing substantial employment or export earnings. If free trade zones do little more than encourage tax evasion and money laundering, whilst posing a significant threat to jobs and investment in other parts of the country through the displacement effect, who benefits? The answer is clear: the rich, not the workers.

A recent report from the European parliament’s special committee on financial crimes, tax evasion and tax avoidance highlighted precisely these concerns, noting that customs-free sites intended as storage facilities for goods in transit were being used to hoard or launder high-value assets by the super-rich. These concerns echo those of the intergovernmental Financial Action Task Force, whose 2010 reviewnoted serious concerns about how a combination of tax incentives and relaxed monitoring and supervision – even by competent regulators – has resulted in a reduction in finance and trade controls and enforcement. This has in turn created opportunities for money laundering and the financing of terrorism. The task force considers that “the same characteristics that make FTZs attractive to legitimate business also attract abuse by illicit actors” and, more alarmingly, that FTZs have been used in the transport and production of weapons of mass destruction.

Reports from FTZs around the world demonstrate lax enforcement of labour or environmental laws as part of the regulatory holiday given to investors. Workers at Poland’s Tamorbzreg Special Enterprise Zone, for example, were allegedly sacked for striking against poor working conditions. There are similar examples in China, Cambodia and elsewhere. A 2017 European parliament report notes that often in such zones “the governance of labour rights may differ from the rest of the country and fall below international legal standards”.

If this government has its way, FTZs could become the manifestation of our very worst fears about their true political agenda: a race to the bottom on rights and standards. That is why we need a general election, so that an elected Labour government can avoid the chaos of a no-deal Brexit, defend workers’ rights and environmental standards, and unlock the real investment needed across our country.

Barry Responds to Prime Minister’s Pledge on Social Care in B&K Times

Last week I had to laugh when the new prime minister said he wanted to abolish “the fear of having to sell your home to pay for the costs of care”?

Surely I thought everyone would remember that he voted for the £8billion worth of cuts to social care? Surely everyone would remember that just two years ago he stood on a manifesto that wanted to sell your home not just if you had moved into a residential care home, but to pay for social care actually provided in your own home! He was even a member of the cabinet at the time.

Residential care for the elderly now costs on average over £40,000 a year.

Yet government still fails to properly recognise the work that family members do and the money they save the public purse when they take on the care of relatives. Carers allowance is less than £3,500 a year!

Basic attendance allowance to supply the elderly person’s needs is not even that – £3,052!

In Brent many people who are struggling to look after parents with dementia and other care needs will wonder why their loved ones can only get 15 minutes of social care a day.

They will wonder why government does not value the work they do.

Of course people should not be forced to sell their homes to pay for their care. But government ought to restore the £8billion of cuts and start paying carers properly.

A just society is one where everyone gets the care they need throughout their life and where the love and goodwill of relatives is not exploited by government.

Barry writes in the Sunday Express: “We must look beyond the doomsters and gloomsters to the opportunities that a low carbon future presents if we tackle climate change properly”

Last week we had the hottest day the UK has ever seen. This week we got freak summer hailstones and flash floods that crippled whole communities in England. Really the unpredictable chaos of it all is enough to make our new Prime Minister look like a paragon of consistency!   So just for a moment, when Mr Johnson stood on the steps of Downing Street and proclaimed: “The doubters, the doomsters, the gloomsters – they are going to get it wrong”, I couldn’t help thinking he was talking about climate change.

For too long the media and climate scientists have emphasised their own version of Project Fear. We have listened to endless news stories warning of flooding from sea level rise, glaciers vanishing, and coral reefs going extinct – and how little time we have left to save them.

Of course, all that is true — the risks of climate change are indeed grave. Certainly, climate change can wreak far greater havoc on the global economy than Brexit, but we must look beyond the doomsters and gloomsters to the opportunities that a low carbon future presents if we tackle climate change properly.

I was proud that my party persuaded parliament to declare a climate emergency. After all, how can you expect to act as if there is an emergency if you are not even prepared to say that one exists? But an emergency does not have to become a catastrophe. Tackling the climate crisis with the full force of our nation’s entrepreneurial and innovative skill is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to rejuvenate our industrial capacity, benefit our economy, and build a new society that is healthier, fairer and happier than ever before.

If we invest in the green technologies of the future:  homes powered by solar and heated by ground source heat pumps, vehicles powered by hydrogen or electricity — electricity that comes from tidal lagoons or offshore wind turbines.  These are the new technologies that will create hundreds of thousands of new manufacturing and engineering jobs. Jobs in parts of the country that have never recovered from the destruction of our industry. Places where people look back to an industrial past of heavy manufacturing, mining and steel and ask themselves why all those jobs and all that prosperity disappeared? Some have blamed Margaret Thatcher, some have blamed the EU but no matter the analysis, we can all agree that those communities need the new jobs that a New Green Industrial Revolution will create. They need the jobs — and they need the hope and the optimism just as much.

Creating the new jobs of a low carbon industrial future will require companies and particularly our education system to invest in upskilling our workforce, training apprentices and reskilling employees to the highest levels for well-paid jobs in the green economy.

And these investments – which will bring clean power to millions of homes – will not bankrupt the country. Far from it: renewable power like wind and solar energy is now actually the cheapest way to generate electricity. This can mean cheaper energy bills and less pollution for everyone.

Energy bills in the future will not be as expensive as today if we address the challenge of climate change properly, because every home in the country will be made more energy efficient. The days of draughty houses blighted by mould, with damp creeping in on every wall will be a thing of the past. Proper insulation will be an integral part of all new build homes – and we will retrofit our existing housing stock to bring them up to standard as well. Homes fit for human habitation that actually keep us safe, warm and dry and don’t cost a fortune to heat and power. That is the the sort of revolution that most people in Britain would love to see.

And because tackling climate change means less pollution. Our lives will also be healthier as well. We know now that diesel vehicles create particulate matter and other pollutants. In fact, they have created cities where children’s lungs don’t develop properly. Globally, 4 million children develop asthma every year as a result of exhaust fumes from cars and trucks. Tackling climate change through new electric and hydrogen powered vehicles give us the ability to free ourselves from the scourge of toxic air. And this is not just a health benefit. The Independent advisors to government on these matters say that the economic benefits from clean air alone, through greater productivity, resulting in less sick days and fewer patients needing treatment in our hospitals, is equal to 1.5% of the UK’s GDP.

So, we do indeed stand on the threshold of an amazing future. A new economy built upon low carbon technologies. People trained for the skills of the next generation in highly paid engineering and technical jobs that will bring back life to some of our most depressed and forgotten communities. An everlasting supply of clean renewable energy that is cheap and doesn’t damage our children’s lungs or our productivity as a country. What’s not to like?

But all of this depends upon government. Government must prepare for it. No moaning that we can’t make a difference. The fact is that we can and we already have. We have decoupled polluting carbon emissions from economic growth. The UK has increased our GDP by 71% whilst reducing our CO2 emissions by 42%. Around the world 99 other countries (yes — including China and India) have followed the lead we set when we passed the first legally binding Climate Change Act in 2008. Those countries have now passed over 850 laws and policies to tackle climate change. They are catching us up. If we are to continue to lead the world in this new green industrial revolution, just as we did three centuries ago in that first industrial revolution, then we need government to act decisively and effectively to ramp up ambition in every area.

Barry writes to Opticians about Retinoblastoma

Barry attended a parliamentary reception on retinoblastoma, an aggressive form of eye cancer in children. Whilst there he met with his constituent, Hannah, who was born with this horrible illness. After meeting with Hannah he wrote this letter to all GPs and Opticians in Brent North. If you are the parent of a young child and you see any of the symptoms listed in this letter in your child then I urge you to visit your local Opticians or GP.

Retinoblastoma

You may wonder, you may even feel somewhat irked, that I am writing to you about retinoblastoma — a condition which you undoubtedly know much more about than I do as your local MP.  I certainly would not be writing to all the GPs and opticians in Brent North if it had not been for meeting Hannah who is a constituent of mine and whose personal story below I hope might help you in your professional life.

I had no idea that this aggressive form of eye cancer affects 1 child a week in the UK until I met Hannah. These are her own words:

“My name is Hannah, I am 23 and have lived in Brent for most of my life. I was born with a rare childhood eye cancer, bilateral retinoblastoma. It was diagnosed at quite an advanced stage due to a lack of awareness of the cancer and its symptoms: the doctors kept sending my parents away saying there was nothing wrong. By the time I was diagnosed, my left eye had to be enucleated and I underwent numerous courses of chemotherapy, radiotherapy and cryotherapy to save only around 3-6 per cent of my sight in my remaining right eye. If it was diagnosed sooner, I would have probably had more eyesight and not had to undergo so much treatment.

At the age of 16, I had genetic counselling and was told my options in terms of having children in the future, as well as the secondary cancers I am at risk of developing and what to look out for. I have faced cancer scares in the past and have been told by a former GP that I could not be sent for an MRI scan because it was too expensive. But I have also had very supportive doctors around me throughout my life who have helped me through some very difficult times, and for that I am eternally grateful.

Despite all of this, I managed to get to university, achieve a First Class Honours in Politics and am now pursuing a full-time career to make a positive difference.

I cannot change the outcome I have been left with as a result of my late diagnosis but I want outcomes for any future babies or children to be the best they possibly can. One child a week is diagnosed with retinoblastoma, so you may never come across this in your career but there is still a chance you will. Please take a few minutes to review the signs and symptoms in the enclosed leaflet, because you could be the one to spot it and save someone’s sight and life.”

Through Hannah, I was made aware of the vital importance of an early diagnosis. If it is diagnosed early, it can often be successfully treated. However, low awareness of the signs and symptoms among parents and healthcare professionals means that many families experience potentially devastating delays in diagnosis, and around a half of children lose an eye to save their life.

I was informed that one such reason for early detection not taking place is parents being turned away from opticians by front of house staff, and told their child is too young for an eye test. It is therefore essential that ALL staff are made aware of the condition and how to spot it, so it can be properly diagnosed early. The signs and symptoms of retinoblastoma include:

• an unusual white reflection in the pupil – this may be apparent in photos, where only the healthy eye appears red from the flash, or you may notice it in a dark or artificially lit room

• a squint

• a change in the colour of the iris – in 1 eye or sometimes only in 1 area of the eye

• a red or inflamed eye – although the child won’t usually complain of any pain

• poor vision – the child may not focus on faces or objects, or they may not be able to control their eye movements (this is more common when both eyes are affected); they may say they can’t see as well as they used to.

If parents come to opticians with any of these symptoms for their children, then they must not be turned away. Instead, they should be immediately referred to a GP for appropriate tests.

Thank you for taking the time to read this letter and I urge you, if you have not done so already, to take measures to ensure all staff are aware of the signs and symptoms of retinoblastoma, so we can prevent more children having to suffer as Hannah did.

Yours sincerely

Barry Gardiner

Barry speaks in Mexican Congress on climate change and sustainable development

Barry was invited by the UK Embassy in Mexico and the Mexican Chamber of Deputies to deliver a keynote speech on climate change and sustainable development at a conference held in the Mexican Congress building.

More information about the conference can be found here.

As part of his visit he met Martha Delgado, Undersecretary for Multilateral Affairs and Human Rights, to discuss the future of UK-Mexico bilateral partnership on climate change.

Barry attends the Disability Benefits Consortium in Parliament

Barry joined disabled people and representatives from the Disability Benefits Consortium (DBC) for a reception in Parliament.

The event was to launch the latest report from the Consortium – ‘The impact of welfare changes on disabled people’. The DBC is a national coalition of over 80 different charities and other organisations committed to working towards a fair benefits system. You can find a full list of DBC members here.

The report is a culmination of over a year’s worth of research looking in detail at the impact of the last 10 years of welfare reform on disabled people. It was a brilliant opportunity to find out more about the report and to speak to disabled people and people living with health conditions who have experience of claiming welfare benefits. 

Barry writes in the New Statesman: “The Conservatives have shown that they are incapable of addressing the climate crisis”

Barry has written an article for the New Statesman attacking the government’s recent decision to fiddle with the UK’s climate change targets. The full piece can be read on their website here or below.

The government’s manipulation of carbon targets, and its welcome to Donald Trump, has made a mockery of its environmental boasts.

“So, Mr President, perhaps we might now discuss the issue of climate change?”

If ever there were a moment to utilise Britain’s soft power, surely this was it? We had just given the president of the United States the full pomp and ceremony of the Grenadier Guards, a state dinner with Her Majesty the Queen — even an 82-gun salute, for goodness’ sake. Surely now was the moment to press the case for the US remaining in and adhering to the Paris Accord? Or, at the very least, to ask for its endorsement of our bid to host the next major UN Climate Conference (COP26) here in the UK next year?

In fact, it was not Theresa May, but HRH Prince Charles who had the courage to broach the subject with the president, who afterwards confessed that he admired the prince’s concern but pointedly referred to their conversation on “weather change”, rather than climate change. Perhaps it was little wonder that our government seemed to leave climate emergency off the agenda when you consider that, amidst all the pageantry, they had just slipped out the news that they were fiddling the figures around carbon budgets. The UK is using the emissions reductions achieved as a result of the recession, rather than through real policy change, to enable it to meet its target for future carbon budgets.

No wonder, then, that my colleague, Rebecca Long-Bailey, used Trump’s visit to raise the climate emergency when standing in for the Leader of the Opposition at Prime Minister’s Questions. The hapless David Lidington tried to bluster but was … well, hapless. The government’s own independent climate advisers have repeatedly warned against the transfer of unearned reductions.

The reasons are simple. Our current climate targets are too loose. When the Labour government wrote the Climate Change Act, we set what we thought was a hugely ambitious aim of cutting our emissions by 80 per cent from 1990 levels by 2050. But now the science tells us that’s simply not enough. As the government are now finally pledging to do, we must cut our emissions by 100 per cent, making them “net zero” — in other words, ending the UK’s contribution to global warming entirely.

At the very point in history when the world’s climate scientists have agreed that we need to display even greater ambition, because even existing targets won’t be met by our current policies, the government has decided not to ramp up its efforts but to make those inadequate targets easier to achieve through an accounting trick. In fact, doing this will have the effect of allowing our emissions to actually increase over time — at the very moment that they should be falling as sharply as possible.

In crystal-clear and sobering language in a letter from the Committee on Climate Change this February, the government was clearly put on notice that the surplus in question was “not due to policy”, but largely due to the “lasting effects of the recession”.

In that same letter, the government’s advisers warned against carrying forward excess emissions savings from previous years to help meet future carbon budgets. They said doing so “undermines the integrity” of the Climate Change Act, that it would “not be consistent with the aims of the Paris Agreement”. That was the CCC’s “unequivocal advice”. This government has chosen to ignore it.

The climate change minister, Claire Perry, promised MPs in 2017 that it was her intention that the government would not have to use these “flexibilities” to meet our climate targets. Two years later, and despite thousands of schoolchildren taking to the streets to protest against the inadequate response to the climate emergency, this government is going back on its own word.

It also makes a complete mockery of today’s decision to set a target of reaching net-zero emissions. The UK is already off track in terms of meeting its existing carbon budgets, let alone more stringent ones. Giving themselves the permission to dump more polluting CO2 into the atmosphere slows the transition to a zero-carbon economy and will force even steeper cuts later down the line.

That will make it harder and more expensive for businesses to reach the net-zero end goal. We know the government are concerned about this. Last week it emerged that the Chancellor had privately written to the Prime Minister to express his view that net-zero would cost the government £1trn. But this claim has been widely debunked by economists. It misleadingly asserts that all these costs would fall entirely on government at the expense of investment in our public services; it doesn’t acknowledge the basic fact that the cost of climate action will be spread out over the next three decades; and, worst of all, it fails to understand the significant economic benefits and job opportunities that a Green Industrial Revolution would bring. The truth is that, in weakening our climate targets, this government risks making climate action costlier, not cheaper.

As for the timing? Well, it couldn’t be worse. The decision on whether the UK wins the bid to host COP26 is due later this month; but this latest news will hardly give the UN confidence that our government are fit to host such an all-important summit.

Theresa May has little by way of legacy. Perhaps it would have been different if she hadn’t surrounded herself with climate science deniers. Fifteen cabinet ministers serving under her during her three years in office have been implicated in climate science denial either through worryingly close ties to climate deniers or, worse, denial themselves. But here was a chance to secure genuine leadership on climate action and host the UN climate conference in the UK.

Instead, May will be remembered for the expansion of Heathrow Airport and deregulating the fracking industry, making it easier to drill a well than build a conservatory. And now, in her final days at No 10, she may well have sabotaged any hope that her successor could punch above their weight when it comes to meeting our legal obligations to stop the climate crisis. It is an act that future generations should neither forgive, nor forget.