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Political Leadership

Voters want political leadership on climate change

21 February 2024

In early 2024, Labour announced a reduction in its green investment commitments if it were to win power. Voters want consistency on climate change, whichever party is in power.

Following repeated political attacks, worsening economic conditions, reports of internal disagreements, and endless lobby briefings, Labour announced during the first week of February, 2024, that their pledge to spend £28 billion a year on green investment had been reduced to just under £24 billion (across the entire parliamentary term). It’s important to take stock of the public mood, and what voters will make of the shift in policy.

How much do the numbers matter?

There’s good reason to think the public was never wedded – or opposed – to the £28 billion figure: big, abstract numbers like this are not how voters think about the green transition. But reducing the financial commitment has meant lowering the ambition of universally popular policies like home insulation. In that very real sense (damper, colder homes), it matters – and so do the ‘optics’. Flip-flopping on climate leadership is unlikely to win Labour any votes, just as Rishi Sunak’s announcements of delays to some net zero policies last year didn’t increase support for the Conservatives.

Voters want consistency on climate change, whichever party is in power.

Leadership and U-turns

Beyond the question of how many billions will be invested, the public and businesses want and expect political leadership on climate change. The government is viewed by the public as being ‘out of touch’ when delaying and rolling back on net zero policies, and the word most commonly selected by the public to describe politicians (of any party) watering down net zero commitments is ‘untrustworthy’.

YouGov polling, conducted just after the Labour announcement, shows that 44% of the public thinks the Labour party is not taking climate change seriously, compared to 29% who do. Separate YouGov polling from this week shows that 41% of Labour voters see government U-turns as ‘a bad sign’.

Why do voters support green policies? 

Polling data shows clearly and consistently that people are worried about climate change, and voters and MPs across the political spectrum support the principle and the ambition of cutting the UK’s carbon emissions by 2050.

The wide range of climate impacts people expect the country to experience in the next ten years include rising bills and costs – so a programme of investment that stimulates growth and reduces spiralling energy costs from insecure gas imports is likely to be a vote winner. And message testing shows that voters are not easily persuaded to drop their support for green spending by the argument that net zero will ‘cost the government billions we could be spending on other more pressing areas’.

Green policies have to be (and feel) fair 

When it comes to the UK’s net zero targets and specific green policies like ramping up home insulation (one of the immediate victims of the downgraded investment figure), there is wide support across political divides. But the path to net zero has to be (and feel) fair. Green measures (like insulation) can save households money – but also have an upfront cost unless they’re subsidised in a fair way. Many people are willing to make changes in their own lives to help tackle climate change – from cutting down household energy to making dietary changes. Strikingly, even some of those on the lowest incomes say they would take on extra costs to tackle climate change.

But the top 1% of earners in the UK are responsible for the same amount of carbon dioxide emissions in a single year as the bottom 10%, so household changes made by those with the highest carbon footprints have a dramatically bigger impact – and this group is much more able to bear the costs of the transition.

Climate Barometer data shows that the public feel the fossil fuel industry and energy companies should pay the majority of the costs when it comes to reaching net zero. And in research with working class voters, more than half agreed that it is important to combat climate change but “people like me should not be paying the cost of policies to reduce global carbon emissions”. 

So perhaps the missing piece of the puzzle for voters on the financing of green policies is the question of ‘who pays’ and how this kind of investment will create the conditions for a truly fair, green transition – something a focus on the headline investment figure could too easily obscure.

The latest from the Political Leadership timeline:

Opinion Insight 7th October 2024

New study: Political leaders’ actions can inspire behavioural change

New research has revealed that politicians visibly ‘leading by example’ can substantially increase the willingness of members of the UK public to adopt further low-carbon lifestyle changes.

The study looked at over a thousand people’s responses to the examples of  ‘high-profile individuals’ in a nationally representative survey. It found that the vast majority (86%) wanted to see politicians, celebrities and business leaders setting a good example in terms of their climate actions. Citizens were also more willing to adopt low-carbon actions, such as flying less, eating less meat, or driving an electric car if they saw leaders doing the same. At the same time, people’s overall approval of leaders who were setting a strong example improved.

Despite this, further investigation showed that politicians may currently be reluctant to publicise their personal climate-friendly actions due to fear of criticism for virtue signaling, or hypocrisy.

Together the work suggests that rather than pulling off ‘green stunts’, politicians’ consistency of action over time is crucial, and it can also be beneficial if they acknowledge that some changes may be too difficult or costly for everyone to make (such as buying an electric car or installing a heat pump).

Policy Insight 12th July 2024

New Labour government announces planning reforms to increase onshore wind development

In a widely anticipated move, the new Labour government announced reforms to the planning system which make the development of onshore wind farms easier (the previous Conservative government had a def-facto ‘ban’ in place).

Onshore wind is a very popular form of energy, which people across the political spectrum support. Whilst reforms of the planning system remove an important barrier to the development of onshore wind farms, early (and inclusive) community engagement is also a critical piece of the puzzle.

YouGov carried out polling just after the July 4th General Election, focused on the planning reforms Labour had announced. Whilst building houses on the ‘green belt’ provoked across-the-board opposition, building green infrastructure was widely popular:

Six in ten (60%) Britons favour ending the current ban in England on building new onshore wind farms, with more strongly supporting such an overturn (30%) than opposing it to any degree (23%). Not only can this policy count on the support of at least half of all groups, it is the most popular of Labour’s proposed reforms among Conservative voters, with 54% in favour of scrapping the ban.

 

  • Source: GOV.UK
  • Date: 8th July 2024
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