Major trade union warns net zero drive at risk of becoming ‘political millstone’
Energy Secretary Ed Miliband (Image: Getty)
Labour‘s biggest union backer has attacked the Government’s net zero drive. Unite warned that the plans risk becoming a “political millstone” around the party’s neck.
It comes after Labour former prime minister Sir Tony Blair voiced criticism over policies to achieve net zero by 2050. The union called on the Government to “deliver an industrial strategy underpinned by a fully-funded workers’ transition, or net zero will become a political millstone around Labour’s neck”.
General secretary Sharon Graham said: “Unite is not against net zero, but it will not be achieved without serious investment in new jobs.
“Unite has warned time after time that all the rhetoric about a joined-up industrial strategy and future jobs must be backed up with serious investment that actually delivers. What is Labour waiting for? The time to act is now.
“If they fail to do this, then Labour cannot expect workers to support their net zero plan.”
In a foreword to a report by his think tank, the Tony Blair Institute (TBI), published earlier this week, the New Labour prime minister argued that the current climate approach “isn’t working”.
Sir Tony said: “People know that the current state of debate over climate change is riven with irrationality … any strategy based on either ‘phasing out’ fossil fuels in the short term or limiting consumption is a strategy doomed to fail.”
He added that most political leaders “would like to start taking some of the hysteria out of the climate debate but are reluctant to be the first to do so”.
His intervention was seized on by political opponents, including Reform UK leader Nigel Farage.
Downing Street has rejected Sir Tony’s claim that “hysteria” is playing a part in the international debate on climate change.
Asked whether current Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer believed hysteria was present in the international debate on climate change, his spokesman said: “I don’t think so, I mean, I think we’re taking a very practical and pragmatic approach to this here in the UK.”
He said the Government’s net zero policy would help with jobs growth and investing in the industries of the future, adding: “The PM has said previously that we will deliver net zero in a way that treads lightly on people’s lives, not telling them how to live or behave.
“We are focused on our mission to be a clean-energy superpower.”
