The Green Transition: The end of the consensus?
Weekly analysis of the shift towards a new economy.
Dear Reader,
Happy Friday – it’s Jonny Ball here. I write on economic growth for the New Statesman’s Spotlight team. We report on the nitty gritty of the policy world for all the assorted policy-bods out there. You know who you are and we see you. You can find our coverage here.
We’ve had another big week for the green economy (or lack thereof) after the first mailout of The Green Transition last Friday. If you missed that: Green Times is now The Green Transition. We’re providing a weekly dose of updates and analysis on the new, green economy, and the accompanying economic shifts embraced by governments in the US and Europe. There’s change afoot: the watchwords are moving from openness, efficiency and globalisation, to resilience, security and sustainability. We’re seeing a marriage of fiscal stimulus, public investment, industrial strategy and the push for net zero, from the Green Prosperity Plan, to the EU Green Deal, to Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act.
That’s enough explanation – as usual, do get in touch with any tips, comments, corrections or suggestions. Let’s get right into it.
The end of the consensus?
It’s looking like the Uxbridge by-election could go down as one of the more consequential in recent history, setting the starting gun on knotty debates that are highlighting splits on decarbonising the economy. How do we get to net zero? Who will pay? How does the government take the public with them for a transition that will require billions of pounds of investment? (Indeed, former chancellor Philip Hammond reckons the true cost for Britain to be over a trillion).
The standard response, particularly on the left, is to say that net zero is actually an economic opportunity rather than a threat. Big investments will yield big returns: boosts to high-value jobs, tax receipts, regional growth, productivity, energy security, and economic resilience. That’s certainly the thinking behind “Bidenomics”. And yet the dividing lines are becoming more blurred.
This week, Lord Deben (John Gummer to his friends) – the Thatcher-era cabinet minister and now chair of the independent Climate Change Committee – has penned a piece for Spotlight that says the government’s decision to grant a hundred new oil and gas licenses in the North Sea is “unworthy” of the Conservative Party. The government’s own adviser on climate writes that it will leave the UK’s hard-won global climate leadership credentials in tatters.
Environmental experts and eco-aware Tories have lined up to condemn the new licenses. Green Alliance’s executive director Shaun Spiers puts the decision down to “electoral politics, not sound policy”. There’s disagreement about the electoral calculus, though. As wannabe Tory candidate and Onward think tank director Seb Payne has written, scrapping net zero targets would “cost the Conservative Party 1.3m votes”. Net zero “is too important to be left to radicals”, he adds. Thanks, Seb.
But, it’s not that simple. A snap YouGov poll after the announcement asked if the government was “right or wrong to issue new licenses for oil and gas”. Forty-two per cent said right, against only 27 per cent for wrong. Data aficionado John Burn-Murdoch has a great Twitter thread showing that the Great British public are more supportive of environmental policies than voters in the US, Germany or France. But that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re against the new licenses policy. A reminder, perhaps, that most of the British public has better things to do than follow the minutiae of policy debates and adopt consistent lines accordingly.
Rishi Sunak, meanwhile, says he wants to “max out” the North Sea in a bid to improve energy security and prioritise domestic production over foreign imports. Energy Secretary Grant Shapps has said Labour’s position of barring new licenses if and when they enter Number 10 is “mad”, that it threatens 200,000 jobs in the sector, deprives the Exchequer of revenues, and leaves Britain “at the behest of foreign nations”. For good measure, the Prime Minister took to Twitter/X to troll opponents claiming that Labour wanted to “support Russian jobs” by opposing new drilling. Is that what the internet calls “owning the libs”?
That puts him in around the same political arena as one Gary Smith – not a global warming sceptic of the Tory right, but the leader of the GMB trade union. He wants Labour not to cave into what he calls the “bourgeois environment lobby” and “secure our energy supply” to “face down threats from authoritarian regimes”.
Smith cites “trade union comrades from the USA” who support the renewable-friendly IRA agenda, as well as Biden’s continued granting of oil and gas extraction licenses, which outpaced President Trump’s in his first two years. “They believe in plans, not bans”, he says. Similarly, Sharon Graham of Unite has warned “we will not let the workers in oil and gas become the miners of tomorrow”.
As the dash to a green economy becomes ever more urgent, it seems the debates on how we get there have only just begun.
In Brief
Net zero to hero: the FT’s Janan Ganesh, has this bold write-up on the energy and environment debates that have grabbed headlines since Uxbridge. He has hailed the tentative cooling-down on net zero targets as the “beginning of the end of the net zero consensus”.
Just Stop spoil??: Labour MP, former President of the National Union of Mineworkers, and long-time Corbyn-aligned lefty Ian Lavery writes for the New Statesman on “the dangers of a so-called just transition” and questions the provocative tactics of Just Stop Oil. “While their cause is noble”, he says, “their actions disproportionately impact working-class people. Their TV spokespeople are erudite and confident but there is a notable lack of working-class voices. The latter are more aware of the impact their actions may have on people struggling to put bread on the table and understand the harm arrest and prison terms may do to their career prospects, something well-connected, middle-class activists are less likely to consider.” Food for thought, certainly, and indicative of the growing net zero divides across the political spectrum.
Storage Wars: Nick Ferris has the low-down on carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology in this must-read for Spotlight. Critics say it is “difficult and expensive” and “too good to be true”. Along with oil and gas licenses, the government pushed forward on CCS sites this week.
We are not worthy: John Gummer, former Tory minister and the government’s current climate adviser, has written this damning piece on the government’s recent North Sea announcements, which he says are “unworthy” of his party.
Green awakening: Zoë Grünewald profiles Green Party co-leader Carla Denyer, on proportional representation, her party’s record running Brighton, and the problem with the Labour Party. If you thought the Green Properity Plan’s £28bn/year spend was big, the Greens promise £100bn. Denyer also reckons she’s in with a chance of clinching Bristol West at the next general election. “It’s not going to be easy, I’m not cocky about it”, she tells Zoë. “In 2019 we had 11 councillors in Bristol as a whole. We now have 25. So we’re the largest political group in Bristol”. Certainly one to watch now that Caroline Lucas has announced she’ll be standing down in Brighton Pavillion.
No time for histrionics: Last but not least, the chief executive of the multinational energy company SSE – one of the likely beneficiaries of the new North Sea licenses – has written for Spotlight on why abandoning net zero would be a “historic mistake”.
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The Green Transition is a part of Spotlight, the New Statesman's online policy section and print supplement. Spotlight reports on policy for the people who shape it and the business leaders it affects. Explore our in-depth reporting and analysis here.
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Please send any news or comments to: jonathan.Ball@newstatesman.co.uk
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