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Climate Barometer tracker data over the past 12 months shows that MPs think that the environment has declined in salience for the public. However, this is not mirrored in public opinion data, which continues to show climate and the environment are important to voters…
Worries about the cost of living have loomed so large – for voters and in terms of their dominance in the political discourse – that MPs may assume public concern about climate change has dropped.
One way to read the Conservative Party’s recent rhetorical turn against net zero policies (positioning them as unduly costly) is a calculation that voters don’t care about the environment as much as they actually do, and that anything that can be presented as reducing costs will be popular.
As Ipsos polling from August indicates, people do worry that currently cannot afford to ‘do more’ to protect the environment – but the importance of climate change hasn’t diminished.
The most popular new policy in Rishi Sunak’s announcement of net zero changes (for Conservative and Labour voters) was an increased government grant for heat pumps – i.e. a policy change that made making a positive environmental choice cheaper.
And polling by the think tank Onward found that green policies were ranked last in a list of potential causes of the cost-of-living crisis.
When asked, only 17% of MPs think that the environment is a top issue for the public, but this is not mirrored in public opinion data, which consistently shows the environment polling higher. In our most recent round of polling, ‘the environment’ was selected as a top 3 issue by 26% of the public.
Following months of sweltering heatwaves, record-breaking wildfires and five regions in drought, this week it was provisionally confirmed that 2025 was the UK’s hottest summer on record.
While this new record was made ‘70 times’ more likely by climate change, the overwhelming sentiment is that the country is not prepared for more summers like this. The UK’s official climate advisors, practitioners who work on the frontline of the heatwave response, and the British public all agree that the UK isn’t ready for more extreme weather,worsening heat, and compounding risks like water scarcity and wildfires.
At the same time, there are important perception gaps to address. Despite the alarming statistics about heat-related deaths in the UK, many people were looking forward to the first heatwaves this summer. Lots think that heatwaves will only become a problem for the UK in the future. And many believe that hot weather poses more of a risk to other people, not themselves.
In this context there are important conversations now happening about how to grapple with the growing climate risks in the UK, including the sudden lurch towards air conditioning (despite its potential to make heat risks worse).
For more on the key issues surrounding heat communication, check out our recent opinion piece in Climate Home News.
A climate of silence in the UK?
New analysis from Climate Barometer reveals more than half of Britons say they ‘rarely’ or ‘never’ share their opinions on climate change in everyday conversations.