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Polarisation is the divergence of attitudes away from the centre, and towards the extremes. It is more than simply the presence of differences in opinion between people with different political values, although it is often used as a catch-all term for describing differences in opinion among the public.
In Anglophone nations, especially the US and Australia, sharp divides between left and right-wing political ideologies have long been a defining feature of the climate change discourse. And the UK has its own specific history when it comes to polarisation of public and political opinion on climate change.
Tracker data published twice a year by the Climate Barometer shows clear differences between left and right-leaning voters on some issues (for example on support for phasing out the sale of new petrol and diesel cars) but much less divergence elsewhere (for example around support for reaching net zero by 2050). Among MPs, there is more volatility and starker polarisation especially around support for onshore wind among Conservative MPs.
The story of polarisation around climate change in the UK continues, and this thread presents opinion data showing differences and commonalities across social and political divides alongside key political developments and resources for engaging across the political spectrum.
The Conservative Party suffered their ‘worst ever’ result at the 2024 General Election. As well as general dissatisfaction with the Conservative government, polls consistently showed that worries about the cost of living, the condition of the NHS (and for some, immigration) were the biggest influences on how people voted.
Climate change – and more broadly environmental problems like air pollution and sewage in rivers – were also cited by voters when asked to select their top three most important issues going into the election. But was climate change a ‘vote winner’ at the election?
Echoing previous research showing an appetite for greater leadership on climate change, a large (20,000 people) survey by Focal Data on behalf of Persuasion and ECIU found that 53% of voters who had switched their vote from Conservatives to Labour (or the Liberal Democrats) believed that Government policy on climate change should be going further and faster that it has been (27% thought it should be going more slowly).
And polling by More in Common on behalf of E3G went even further, showing that Rishi Sunak’s decision (in September 2023) to slow down some of the country’s net zero policy timelines had a negative impact on voters. People were twice as likely to say that delaying net zero targets was one of Sunak’s biggest mistakes, than his biggest achievements.
Whilst the General Election was not fought on climate and net zero grounds (compared with the last General Election in 2019, there were roughly 50% fewer mentions of ‘climate’ in the British media election coverage), these findings suggest that there is currently no political capital to be found in opposing green policies.
The only party standing on an anti-net zero ticket were Reform UK – but the same More in Common polling found that immigration was overwhelmingly the reason that people voted for this party. Only 4% selected Reform’s environmental policies as a reason for voting for them.
Polling by Opinium for the Conservative Environment Network (CEN), conducted just before the 2024 General Election was announced, suggests that playing into Reform UK’s anti-net zero stance will not be a vote winner for the Conservative party.
One important finding is that although Reform UK is (uniquely among the other mainstream parties) campaigning on an anti-net zero ticket, climate change is not currently a salient issue for Reform voters. The CEN polling found that only 2% of Reform voters listed climate change/net zero/environment as their primary concern (the majority chose immigration as their primary concern).
This mirrors polling carried out across multiple European countries, ahead of the EU election which saw significant gains for far-right parties. In Europe, as in the UK, the rise in support for right wing parties does not appear to be driven by these parties’ policies on climate change (even if they tend to hold anti-net zero positions).
A number of recent polls have suggested that younger generations – including teenagers – are showing some signs of climate fatigue.
New data collected across 33 countries by Ipsos and published on Earth Day found evidence of what they describe as rising apathy and fatalism among the young (especially men):
Millennial and Generation Z men feel more apathetic and fatalistic about climate change compared with older generations and with women. Three in ten say it’s already “too late” to tackle climate change. Similar proportions of young males agree there’s no point changing their own behaviour to tackle climate
change because it won’t make any difference anyway (Gen Z men, 32%; Millennial men 31%) .
Ipsos report considerable variation across different countries – a full 67% of Indian respondents felt it was already too late to do anything about climate change, whereas most in most other countries the level of agreement with this sentiment was between 20-30%.
But the age-based differences are clear across the large, international sample as a whole, and in the UK
And they underscore the importance of communication and engagement strategies that (whilst not shying away from the stark realities of climate change) do not stoke a sense of fatalism and erode any sense of agency among the public.
In the past 6 months, both the Conservatives and Labour have reduced their green policy ambitions. First, the Conservatives announced delays to some near-term net zero targets. more recently, Labour said it would no longer be investing £28 billion per year into green projects. Across this period, polls have indicated that voters expect leadership from politicians on climate change, and want more (rather than less) action on climate.
New polling from Redfield & Wilton (in the wake of these announcements) asked voters for the two main parties to select between a number of competing statements, across a range of topics.
Conservative voters are more likely to believe that the threat of climate change is not being taken seriously (66%) than they are to believe that the threat of climate change to the UK has been overstated (34%). For Labour voters, a full 77% believe climate change is not being taken seriously enough, with only 23% seeing the risk to the UK as overstated.
Using an AI-supported analysis of climate change content on Youtube (going back to 2018), a report from the Centre for Countering Digital Hate makes a distinction between ‘old denial’ narratives (e.g. that global temperatures aren’t increasing), and ‘new denial’ narratives (e.g. that rising global temperatures can in fact be beneficial). Whilst ‘old denial’ narratives are now less common, ‘new denial’ narratives have increased and now constitute 70% of climate denial content on Youtube in 2023.
Strikingly, in a nationally representative survey of young people in the UK, 31% of respondents aged 13-17 agreed that ‘Climate change and its effects are being purposefully over-exaggerated’, rising to 37% among teenagers who were heavy users of social media.
This stands in contrast with Climate Barometer tracker data, where the claim that climate change is exaggerated was unpopular among young people aged 18-24 (a slightly older age group), perhaps indicating a pivot between earlier and later teenage years on susceptibility to this form of ‘new denial’ narrative. Alternatively, it may be a cohort effect that hasn’t been obvious because the majority of polling focuses on those aged 18 and over.
Content which is critical of clean energy solutions, seeking to discredit them or draw attention to the financial costs of green policies, was included in the ‘new denial’ category. An analysis of newspaper editorials in 2023 by Carbon Brief found a record number of UK newspaper editorials opposing climate action (almost exclusively from right-leaning titles) utilising very similar arguments.
An analysis by the website Carbon Brief has found a record number of editorials in UK newspapers (almost exclusively right-leaning publications) that oppose climate action. Carbon Brief writes:
Newspapers such as the Sun and the Daily Mail published 42 editorials in 2023 arguing against climate action – nearly three times more than they have printed before in a single year. They called for delays to UK bans on the sale of fossil fuel-powered cars and boilers, as well as for more oil-and-gas production in the North Sea. In response to such demands, prime minister Rishi Sunak performed a “U-turn” in September on some of his government’s major net-zero policies.
Climate Barometer tracker data suggests a correspondence (cause and effect is harder to establish) between the views of Conservative MPs on net zero policies, and the views expressed in these editorials. But among the public there is not such a clear relationship, with even Conservative voters ambivalent on whether delays to net zero targets are in touch, or out of touch with public sentiment:
Opposition to climate policies is not only found in right-leaning editorials, however. An analysis by the the Centre for Countering Digital Hate found a surge in what they call ‘new denial’ narratives on Youtube in 2023. These include attempts to discredit green energy technologies, or exaggerate their cost – positions that mirror the editorial content analysed by Carbon Brief.
Writing for Labour List, More in Common’s Luke Tryl sets out why there is a chance to increase support among crucial ‘Red Wall’ voters (represented by the Loyal Nationals audience in More in Common’s Britain’s Choice model), arguing that:
Perhaps the area with the greatest potential lies in Labour’s green prosperity plan. Public support for the plan is high at 57%, rising to 61% among loyal national voters and a mammoth 84% among the group of voters who opted for the Conservatives in 2019 but who are now voting Labour.
Coupled with Public First polling showing that delaying net zero whilst failing to tax oil and gas companies is a vote loser, there is clearly a space for making a bolder, fair pitch to the electorate on green policies: consistent political leadership is an essential piece of the puzzle for building public support for the specifics of the transition.
Commentary & Analysis
20th October 2023
The UK has (so far) avoided the sort of stark polarisation seen in nations like the US and Australia. But the country has its own particular story to tell on polarisation and climate change.
Commentary & Analysis
20th October 2023
The Uxbridge by-election in July 2023 was not the start of a culture war on climate. But October 2023’s by-elections can’t be read as a ringing endorsement of climate policies across the board.
Centre-right think tank Onward (with Public First) explored Conservative voters’ attitudes towards a wide range of climate policies (some government policy, others not) in a report titled Hotting Up: How we get to net zero in a way that brings people with us
Three key takeaways are:
Voters expect ambition from the government alongside pragmatism
Support for climate action remains strong among voters, including 2019 Conservatives. The net zero by 2050 target enjoys strong support from the British public (56%) and 2019 Conservative voters (49%), far outweighing opposition (13% and 20% respectively). 43% of Conservative voters think tackling climate change is the most serious challenge facing the world, ahead of war (38%) and mass migration (38%).
Voters see shifts in net zero policy through the lens of ‘anti-politics’
The most common responses among the public if the Government was to get rid of the net zero target is that they would be worried about future generations (33%) and would consider the Conservatives to be untrustworthy (26%). With 2019 Conservative voters, the picture is more nuanced. The highest response was still that it would make them worried for future generations (28%).
Voters are cautious about costs of net zero, but optimistic about benefits
The Government should not mistake scepticism against single unfair policies for opposition to environmental policy in general. 53% of the public are willing to accept costs to tackle climate change, while 40% are not. Focus group participants were overwhelmingly negative about the ULEZ expansion to Greater London, which they saw as an unjust tax on the poor disguised as an environmental policy. Out of ten options given, net zero was the last to be blamed by the public (16%) for a higher tax burden.
In research carried out just before Rishi Sunak’s speech announcing changes to the UK’s net zero targets in September 2023 (including a 4,000 sample, nationally-representative poll and eight focus groups of 2019 Conservative voters who are now undecided), Public First’s James Frayne argues that Sunak’s speech will have a maginally negative impact on overall support for the Conservatives. Read Frayne’s analysis here:
Sunak’s Net Zero speech may scarcely cut through to voters at all outside the bubble
Commentary & Analysis
18th September 2023
Author of the research Matthew Goodwin describes net zero as “a pet project among an out-of-touch, morally righteous and self-serving elite.”
Trust & influence: Beyond ‘trusted messengers’
Trust is the currency in which all communicators trade – and currently, its in short supply. Against this backdrop, do climate campaigns stand a chance?