Abandoning Net Zero
On 2 nd October Kemi Badenoch announced that the Conservative Party would drop the UK’s Net Zero target if it came into office. An article from Energy Live quoted her saying that her party wants “to leave a cleaner environment for our children, but not by bankrupting the country. Climate change is real. But Labour’s laws tied us in red tape, loaded us with costs, and did nothing to cut global emissions. Previous Conservative governments tried to make Labour’s climate laws work – they don’t. Under my leadership we will scrap those failed targets. Our priority now is growth, cheaper energy, and protecting the natural landscapes we all love.” She now regards the 2050 net zero target as impossible and wishes to “maximise” oil and gas extraction from the North Sea. (Energy Live, 2025). The article comments that her position ‘rips up more than 15 years of cross-party consensus’. It notes that the Climate Change Act was passed in 2008 under Gordon Brown’s Labour government when Ed Miliband w...