Next week, the next seminar in Progress’s First 100 Days series will cover an unavoidably big issue, the environment. The issue is by no means brand new. Labour, in its ten years in office, has already taken significant action by signing the 1999 Kyoto treaty on carbon emissions, and entering into the EU’s emissions trading scheme. The government is comfortably on course to meet its target, under the treaty, to cut its emission of certain greenhouse gasses by 12.5 per cent by 2010.
But debate has moved on. It is now a fact of political life, both nationally and internationally, that far more needs to be done by governments, companies and individuals if the world is to avoid the catastrophic consequences of climate change. In the UK, a report by the Treasury economist, Sir Nicholas Stern, found that warming at the current rate could cut global GDP by 20 per cent in the coming decades, and lead to a world more prone to famines, natural disasters and wars. The scientific basis for this, that global warming is man-made and we can make a difference by changing our behaviour, is now accepted by all but a fringe element of scientists, as shown by the recent report of the UN’s Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change.
British politics have also altered. David Cameron, since becoming Conservative leader in late 2005, has become closely identified with green causes, despite espousing few concrete measures so far. Polling shows that Labour lags behind both the Tories and the Liberal Democrats on this issue in the minds of voters. So the next Labour prime minister, on taking office later this year, will have to make progress on this issue not only in the long-term interests of humanity, but also in the short-term interests of the party.
What can be done? Clearly 100 days is an absurdly short time frame for an issue that requires painstaking international co-operation and scientific rigour. But some bold, indicative steps could be taken. Two very recent government moves have already laid a framework for this. The recently introduced climate change bill commits the UK to cutting UK carbon emissions by 60 per cent by 2060. And EU environment ministers have agreed to cut Europe’s emissions by 20 per cent by 2020, and to push for a worldwide agreement for a 30 per cent cut by the same year.
This is all very well in principle. But the really hard part is the actual measures the government will have to take to realise these targets, and that is the major environmental challenge facing Labour’s next leader. There is good reason to believe that the party can retake the initiative from Cameron on the environment. As Stephen Hale, director of the Green Alliance and a speaker at the seminar next week has pointed out, the Tory leader may find it difficult to square his party’s natural antipathy to state action, with the clear fact that it is governments who must take the lead if we are to adequately meet the challenges of global warming.
Labour’s role is also crucially important because of the party’s belief in equality. Stern rightly noted that we must ensure that the costs of taking action are fairly spread between rich and poor, both within countries and internationally, as well as from one generation to the next. Measures such as taxes on roads, petrol and air travel all have the potential to be highly regressive, that is, to penalise the poor much more than the rich. Very little in the history of Conservative thought suggests that this would cause much concern to the Tory party, so it is vital that Labour is able to exert influence over an issue that will remain for generations to come.
Join us next week in Westminster and join the debate.