Rishi Sunak is considering weakening some of the government’s key green commitments in a major policy shift.
It could include delaying a ban on the sales of new petrol and diesel cars and phasing out gas boilers, multiple sources have told the BBC.
The PM is preparing to set out the changes in a speech in the coming days.
There is no suggestion that Mr Sunak is considering abandoning the legal commitment to reach net zero carbon emissions by 2050.
But he is expected to declare that other countries need to bear more of the burden of dealing with climate change.
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What’s the reason behind this? Most obvious reason looks like lobbying money, but is there anything other than that?
It all ends up at the answer @MapTheft gave you but to understand what’s happening here in a bit more detail:
The Conservatives are very unpopular and are going to lose the next election. They know this and so they’re looking to improve their position so a) they don’t lose as badly as they might otherwise and b) be in a position to capitalise on the next Labour government’s unpopularity.
Obviously they aren’t going to do this by stopping from acting like cunts so their options are somewhat limited.
Recently they won a by-election that everyone thought they’d lose and it is generally thought that what swung it in their favour was opposition to ULEZ, a clean air initiative which disproportionately affects poor drivers. It’s probably a necessary measure to protect the health of Londoners but the way it is implemented means that people will be out of pocket.
The Tories, casting around for easy answers have decided that the public don’t like ‘green’ measures. So if they drag their feet on these proposed changes, their rich mates in the oil sector will like them and shower them with money come election time and beyond and they think that when Labour inevitably have to bring the measures back they will be unpopular and this will give the Tories a chance to make ground the election after next.
Fuck the science, fuck the environment, fuck the poor, fuck international scientific consensus and fuck any kind of global progress, it’s all about electoral calculus by a bunch of morally corrupt shitcunts.
Thanks for the nuanced answer. It sucks how any progress is halted around the world because everything revolves around winning elections.
…I wish politicians would do what they believe is best for the country/world instead of their party… dammit
The Tories have never had the interests of the UK population in mind let alone that of foreigners. They exist for one reason, to line their pockets and those of their donors. They get votes the same way the US GOP does: channeling hatred of “other” and promising things they rarely deliver.
Because ultimately, he is a cunt.
Since when did the conservative government need any more justification other than “it makes us rich”
A leadership devoid of ideas and desperately throwing anything at the wall in the hope it sticks.
Before today this was one of the latest talking points from Liz Truss, who Sunak has not long replaced. Doesn’t seem a great look to be picking up policy from the still seething rival that you claim to have saved us from.
Voter’s in Uxbridge didn’t like the ulez and wanted to keep driving cars despite having 3 tube lines, two mainline rail and busses with frequency measured in minutes…this is on the voters and the man who should be in the Clapham omnibus…but is solo in his Clapham SUV.
The conservative party do a bloody awful job of conserving things don’t they.
I’m actually quite pleased with this because it seemed like Starmer was weakening on environmental issues, especially after the whole Ulez business. Hopefully if the PM is getting flak for diluting his policies on it Starmer will stick to his guns for once
You know the media and therefore the general public will conviniently ignore that though and continue with this narrative that starmer makes labour a worse choice than the tories
Labour could come out with a policy where they eat babies and they would still be a better choice than the Tories.
Seeing another BBC article on it, the following caught my eye.
But a drivers campaign group said it was “delighted” by a potential delay.
Fair Fuel UK said the costs of policy would outweigh the benefits and it was “always doomed to be dropped”.
I wonder who Fair Fuel UK are? Sounds like a good honest grassroots drivers group worried about what’s going to happen to petrol!
Oh, it’s run by somebody called Howard Cox. I wonder who he is…
Oh, he’s a Reform UK swivel eyed loon.
What is it with the BBC and going to mentalist Kipper types for their opinions?
I mean…with an opinion as fucking stupid as that, it’s no wonder he’s the only one the Beeb could find to support it.
I hope anyway…
What an absolute twunt.
This makes me unreasonably annoyed. If Labour follows anywhere near this path I’m voting Green
Keep in mind that every tonne of carbon not emitted is better than one emitted, and even Labour’s less than desirable policies are better than the Tories. While right now it will still be too much to stay under 1.5, we will emit less with a Labour government. That is why priority 1 has to be to get the Tories out.
If you can vote green and the tory won’t win the seat, absolutely go for it, the stronger the message that is sent the better. But if you can’t, vote for whoever is best placed to get/keep the tory out.
Don’t think EV bit changes much, the market is going to kill ICE anyway.
The transition won’t happen quickly enough without it, and there still needs to be some hard incentives to get infrastructure like charging networks up.
Delaying or stopping the ban will cost more time we can ill afford.
I don’t think the future ICE ban is what is driving EV sales. It’s that they are cheap to run and have good performance. And that green feeling. The upfront cost is going down and the range is going up.
The infrastructure is going up fairly fast. Not sure it can go up much faster because of the grid having to change to. Ideally though, you charge at home anyway. I charge away from home only like 5% of the time.
I can only speak for myself but the upcoming ICE ban was a factor in my recent EV purchase. I intend to keep my car for a long time so as we move closer to the ban more and more cars will be EVs so I didn’t want to be left behind.
The other aspects you mentioned were also factors. Particularly after a test drive and feeling the acceleration and quietness of the car.
If the EV sales keep increasing as they have been, the ICE infrastructure will start to shrink and that will increase ICE costs further. There will be economic feedback loops at tipping points.
I think one tipping point may be mechanics. We need to start trainimg mechanics on ev more and then ice will be more. Even things like oil changing facility will become expensive
Then is a general question of vendor lockin with maintenance. This was an issue before EVs. We need more right to repair laws to prevent this shit.
Training for EVs will come with the market, if we can avoid this vendor lockin rubbish.
At the moment it is people with their own home and a driveway. The terrace street/on street parking and the renter’s will struggle to charge at home overnight and charging centers lack both capacity and cheapness and also reliability.
In a recent drive from Cambridge to Reading (so major south east, not even remote in any way. Nearly ran out of charge as two supermarkets were broken and another two service stations were full with people queuing with estimate of 40-60min to start charging plus the 20min charge on that.
Yer, the public changing network is always great. It is best if you can avoid it.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
It could include delaying a ban on the sales of new petrol and diesel cars and phasing out gas boilers, multiple sources have told the BBC.
According to multiple sources briefed on Downing Street’s thinking, Mr Sunak would use the speech to hail the UK as a world leader on net zero.
Some specifics of the speech are still thought to be under discussion, but as it stands it could include as many as seven core policy changes or commitments, documents seen by the BBC suggest.
First, the government would push the ban on the sale of new petrol and diesel cars - currently set to come into force in 2030 - back to 2035.
In addition, Britons will be told that there will be no new taxes to discourage flying; no government policies to change people’s diets; and no measures to encourage carpooling.
The event convenes specialists in climate finance, and aims to help developing economies make adjustments to cut emissions.
The original article contains 476 words, the summary contains 162 words. Saved 66%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
To TL;DR the TL;DR: we did the bare minimum, so now it’s not our problem!
